Michelle Louise Craven

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

Michelle Louise Craven, a trainee solicitor at MLP Law Limited in her final seat in the Wills, Trusts and Probate team, recorded time on nine occasions across three client files for work not yet completed, leading to six invoices charging clients for work not done (totalling 20.2 hours / £2,991.50). The Tribunal found proved the breaches of Principles 4 and 5 and failure to achieve Outcome 1.1 (admitted by the Respondent). However, the Tribunal found NOT proved the alleged breaches of Principle 2 (lack of integrity), Principle 6, and the allegation of dishonesty, accepting that she genuinely intended to complete the work, had been told by a senior colleague that 'anticipated time' recording was acceptable (and to remove the 'anticipated' descriptor), lacked proper training, and was overwhelmed by workload. The Tribunal found her a compelling and truthful witness with low culpability and harm. No order as to sanction was made; she was ordered to pay £3,000 costs (reduced from a £6,567 schedule for unsuccessful allegations and means).

Duties found breached:

• No taking unfair advantage
• Proper basis for allegations

Mitigating factors:

• Trainee solicitor guided by senior colleagues
• Genuine insight demonstrated
• Elected to work as non-practising solicitor until proceedings concluded
• Cooperated with the investigation
• Made admissions during the hearing
• Account remained consistent from when first challenged
• No personal gain or motivation
• Genuinely intended to complete the work
• Struggling with excessive workload and work-related stress
• Inadequate training on time recording and billing
• Good character references

⚠ figures not found verbatim in the source were dropped: ["review_dishonesty_finding_cue_present"]