Basharat Ali Ditta
Allegation / charges
Criminal Convictions
Findings — machine-extracted (anthropic-batch:claude-opus-4-8); verify against the decision
The Respondent, a solicitor, was convicted on 26 October 2011 at South Sefton Magistrates Court of possession of cocaine, and on 1 November 2013 at Liverpool Crown Court of two counts of doing a series of acts tending and intended to pervert the course of public justice (sentenced to 3 years concurrent). The Tribunal found both allegations proved beyond reasonable doubt, holding he breached Principles 1, 2 and 6 by virtue of the convictions. His application to adjourn pending a criminal appeal was refused after the SRA undertook to support setting aside the order if the convictions were quashed. The perverting-the-course-of-justice conduct (passing information between detained co-conspirators and third parties) was found to be the most serious misconduct at the highest level, a gross abuse of his trusted position incompatible with remaining in the profession. He was struck off and ordered to pay costs of £5,200 (reduced from £5,862). The sanction was based on the Crown Court convictions only.
Duties found breached:
Aggravating factors:
- Misconduct was deliberate
- Repeated possession of cocaine on multiple occasions
- Two separate instances of acts intended to pervert the course of justice, months apart
- Solicitor misusing and abusing his trusted and privileged position
- Conduct he knew or ought to have known materially breached his obligations to protect the public and the reputation of the profession
Mitigating factors:
- Previous good record / man of good character