Joanne Elizabeth Tappin; Ria Lakhani

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

Two respondents faced allegations of causing/allowing misleading emails in two conveyancing transactions. The dishonesty allegations against the First Respondent (solicitor) were withdrawn at the outset based on medical evidence; the Tribunal ultimately found none of the allegations against her proved and dismissed them, largely because the Applicant's witnesses (including Taram Khan, who had her own dishonesty findings) were unreliable and the contemporaneous evidence was equivocal. The Second Respondent, a paralegal, withdrew from proceedings on day three; the Tribunal proceeded in her absence, found both allegations proved and expressly found dishonesty under Ivey (sending false emails to RCS and to a client's son to conceal file errors, including that probate had not been granted and no transfer deed had been signed). It also found breaches of Principles 2, 4 and 5. A s.43 order of indefinite duration was made against her. Costs of £54,147.50 were claimed; the Tribunal ordered the First Respondent to pay £10,000 and the Second Respondent £4,500, reduced for means.

Duties found breached:

• Non-discriminatory acceptance and cab-rank

Aggravating factors:

• Deliberate dishonesty in both incidents
• Repeated misconduct within a short period
• Breach of trust - lying to solicitors and to a client's relative
• High culpability and harm; direct control over circumstances

Mitigating factors:

• No prior regulatory findings against the Second Respondent

⚠ figures not found verbatim in the source were dropped: ["unverified_costs_amount=14500"]