Jasbinder Singh Sohal

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

Jasbinder Singh Sohal, sole owner/director of Sterlingking Limited, was found to have made 14 improper payments totalling £2,852,000 from the firm's client account to Person C and third parties between August 2018 and February 2019, creating a client account shortage of the same amount. The SRA Compensation Fund paid out over £3.8m. The Tribunal found dishonesty proven (Ivey test). Additionally, the Respondent was convicted of stalking his former partner (Protection from Harassment Act 1997) and failed to notify the SRA of his conviction. The Tribunal found breaches of multiple SRA Principles and Accounts Rules. Culpability and harm were assessed as very high. The Respondent did not attend; an adjournment application was refused. He was struck off the Roll and ordered to pay costs of £16,280.50.

Duties found breached:

• No unlawful discrimination or harassment
• Non-discriminatory acceptance and cab-rank
• No conflict between current clients
• Self-report to the regulator

Aggravating factors:

• Dishonesty alleged and proven
• Misconduct deliberate, calculated and repeated over a period of time
• Abuse of position of authority handling client money
• Concealment of wrongdoing from clients
• Blamed others (alleged blackmail, unproven)
• For Rule 14: deliberately targeted a vulnerable person
• For Rule 14: abuse of power and conduct involved a form of violence
• For Rule 14: continued to blame the victim after conviction
• Knew or ought to have known conduct breached obligations to protect public and reputation of profession

Mitigating factors:

• No previous disciplinary findings
• Made some early admissions regarding some of the improper payments