Henry Charles William King

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

A Bar Disciplinary Tribunal found two charges of professional misconduct proved (admitted) against barrister Henry King under rC8/Core Duty 5. At a Chambers Christmas party in December 2023, while heavily intoxicated, he sexually touched Person A without consent (under her skirt on the thigh and over clothing on her breast) and made an unwanted comment referencing her protected characteristic, amounting to harassment. The misconduct fell within Group B (sexual nature), lower range, with an indicative sanction of 12-24 months suspension. Given no aggravating factors and exceptional mitigation, the Tribunal (4-1 majority) imposed a reduced 3-month suspension (postponed to 1 April 2025) plus £2,000 + VAT costs. No express finding of dishonesty was made.

Duties found breached:

• Good faith and courtesy to colleagues

Mitigating factors:

• Immediate admission of misconduct and sincere apology to Person A, which was accepted
• Prompt self-report to the BSB
• Full co-operation with Chambers and BSB investigations
• One-off incident, completely out of character
• Demonstrated insight and genuine remorse
• Took voluntary steps to prevent recurrence
• Recognised and addressed own alcohol misuse problem and contributed to a support group for other barristers
• Tribunal judged repetition unlikely
• Good character with no previous disciplinary findings
• Significant contributions to the profession (pupillage committee, Sutton Trust Programme, mentoring)
• Exceptional personal mitigation, having overcome significant adversity