Respondent AR

Findings — machine-extracted (anthropic-batch:claude-opus-4-8); verify against the decision

The Respondent, a partner practising in Office X, admitted engaging in unwanted, inappropriate and sexually motivated conduct towards Person A at leaving drinks on 30 June 2022, repeatedly making sexually explicit comments ('I want to dominate you sexually') despite being told to stop. He admitted breaches of Principles 2 and 5 and Rule 1.2, and admitted lack of integrity (no dishonesty found). The Tribunal approved an agreed outcome of a 24-month suspension plus an undertaking to engage with treatment, and ordered costs of £32,655.07. The Tribunal (by majority, lay member dissenting) granted anonymisation based on joint expert medical evidence indicating real risk to the Respondent's life engaging Articles 2 and 8 ECHR.

Duties found breached:

• Non-discriminatory acceptance and cab-rank
• No conflict between current clients

Aggravating factors:

• Misconduct was deliberate
• Misconduct included sexual misconduct (though no sexualised touching alleged)
• Respondent knew or ought to have known his conduct materially breached obligations to protect the public and the reputation of the legal profession

Mitigating factors:

• Voluntarily self-reported to the regulator
• Single episode or one of very brief duration
• Previously unblemished career