Fiona McKinnon

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

Fiona McKinnon, a Glasgow solicitor, was found guilty of professional misconduct singly and in cumulo for failing over 12 years to progress client MC's personal injury claim, failing to communicate with clients, failing to provide files to her former partner Alan Conroy, failing to obtemper a mandate in LG's divorce case for over two years, and repeatedly failing to respond to the SLCC and Law Society. No dishonesty was alleged or found. The Tribunal censured her and imposed a two-year restriction limiting her to acting as a qualified assistant under an approved employer, effective 12 April 2022, plus liability for expenses. Separately, compensation of £5,000 was awarded to Alan Conroy and £3,000 to MC.

Duties found breached:

• No improper communication with the court
• Act in the client's best interests
• Keep client informed and respond promptly
• Proper termination and return of instructions
• No baseless or threatened misconduct report

Aggravating factors:

• Lack of insight demonstrated by the Respondent
• Conduct likely to seriously damage the reputation of the profession and posed a danger to the public
• Misconduct involved multiple clients/files and persisted over many years
• No steps taken to resolve matters; one client (MW) died before her complaint was resolved
• High risk of repetition

Mitigating factors:

• Clean disciplinary record over a lengthy career
• Cooperated (albeit at a late stage) with the Fiscal and entered into a Joint Minute
• No dishonesty or lack of integrity alleged or found