John Stenhouse

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

A Disciplinary Tribunal found barrister John Alexander Stenhouse guilty of professional misconduct contrary to Core Duty 5 for emails sent to the First-tier Tribunal (Tax Chamber) during his own tax appeal. He made baseless serious allegations that a Senior Tribunal Caseworker and an HMRC officer had secretly conspired to end his appeal (Charge 1(a)) and that the FTT President had covered up/whitewashed that misconduct, in rude and insulting terms (Charge 1(b)). The Tribunal found no breach of rC8 (integrity) and expressly did not find dishonesty. Charges 1(c) (rude 'stop messing me around' emails) and 1(d) (refusal to withdraw/apologise) were not proved. The Tribunal imposed a fine of £7,500 on each proved charge (£15,000 total) and ordered £8,049.48 costs against him; his own costs application was dismissed. A recusal application and abuse of process argument were rejected, and the sanction stage proceeded in his voluntary absence.

Duties found breached:

• Prosecutorial duty of disclosure
• No baseless or threatened misconduct report

Aggravating factors:

• Lack of remorse
• Lack of insight
• Risk of repetition
• Misconduct directed towards a member of court staff / the President of the Tax Tribunal
• Misconduct by a very experienced barrister
• Course of misconduct; recklessness; foreseeable harm

Mitigating factors:

• Good character
• No previous disciplinary findings