Philip John Bailey

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

The Respondent, admitted in 1990 and not currently in practice, was convicted at Stafford Crown Court of conspiracy to defraud after pleading not guilty. The sentencing judge found he had been deliberately dishonest, though the offence was an isolated transaction out of character. The Tribunal would not go behind the criminal conviction and found this was a case of dishonest behaviour found by a criminal court. He was struck off the Roll and ordered to pay costs of £1,000.

Duties found breached:

• Proper basis for allegations

Aggravating factors:

• Convicted of conspiracy to defraud
• Criminal court found deliberately dishonest behaviour

Mitigating factors:

• Single isolated transaction completely out of character
• Co-defendant had committed many such offences whereas Respondent committed only one
• Self-reported the conviction to The Law Society
• Complied with the Confiscation Order
• Accepted that a strike off was inevitable