Grenville Royston Young

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

Grenville Royston Young, a solicitor admitted in 1981 practising as a sole practitioner and later as a freelance solicitor, failed to cooperate with the SRA's investigations between November 2019 and April 2023 and failed to cooperate during and after the SRA's intervention into his practice. He took two years to file a Firm Closure Notification, left client monies (£17,864.77) and live files unresolved, and made withdrawals from the Firm account in breach of the Intervention Notice. He did not engage with the disciplinary proceedings and the hearing proceeded in his absence. The Tribunal found breaches of Principles 2, 5 and 7 and Paragraphs 7.3 and 7.4, finding a lack of integrity but no dishonesty. He was suspended for 24 months, fined £20,000, and ordered to pay costs of £11,940.

Duties found breached:

• Integrity
• Uphold public trust in the profession
• Act in the client's best interests
• Diligence and timeliness
• Report serious misconduct of others

Aggravating factors:

• Conduct was deliberate, calculated and repeated over approximately two years
• Failed to deal with outstanding issues which resulted in the SRA intervention
• Made four withdrawals from the Firm in contravention of the Intervention Notice
• Knew or ought to have known his conduct breached his professional obligations
• Referred to medical conditions but provided no supporting medical evidence

Mitigating factors:

• No previous disciplinary findings
• No dishonesty found
• No abuse of power for personal gain and no concealment of wrongdoing
• Did not seek to blame others
• Some significant health issues (though unsupported by medical evidence)