Susan Hartley

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

The Respondent, admitted in 1986, admitted two allegations of misconduct (and dishonesty). At JWP Solicitors she falsified Trustees' signatures on two cheques to HMRC (£2,900.00 dated 15 Sept 2015 and £3,517.81 dated 15 April 2016) from the RABS Discretionary Trusts. While at KBL Solicitors in November 2013, she caused an improper withdrawal of £8,891.00 from the TM Will Trust client account and misappropriated it to discharge an HMRC debt of the MEF Will Trust. Her motivation was to conceal late tax filings and penalties from clients; she self-reported to her employer in January 2020. The Tribunal accepted the agreed outcome, found the admissions including dishonesty properly made, and ordered her to be struck off plus costs of £5,000.00.

Duties found breached:

• Act in the client's best interests
• No conflict between current clients
• Non-discriminatory acceptance and cab-rank

Aggravating factors:

• Dishonesty
• Misconduct replicated over many years and across different firms, becoming ingrained behaviour
• Deliberate conduct
• Adverse effect on clients (loss to the TM Will Trust of £8,891.00)

Mitigating factors:

• Self-reported the misconduct to her employer
• No financial gain beyond keeping her jobs
• Full admissions including dishonesty
• Loss to the TM Will Trust was rectified by KBL Solicitors