Tharanjit Biring

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

The Respondent, a solicitor, was convicted on 20 July 2017 after trial of committing an act/series of acts with intent to pervert the course of justice, having provided a false witness statement containing targeted lies to assist her co-defendant Mrs B (a solicitor charged with fraud). She was sentenced to 19 months imprisonment. The Tribunal found the allegation proved, with breaches of Principles 1, 2 and 6. It assessed her culpability as high and harm as very significant. The Tribunal referred to Sharma and James, treating the conviction (which it described as involving dishonesty) as requiring strike off absent exceptional circumstances, which it found did not exist. She was struck off the Roll and ordered to pay costs of £1,000 (reduced from £2,934.19 on account of means).

Duties found breached:

• Integrity
• Uphold public trust in the profession
• Non-discriminatory acceptance and cab-rank

Aggravating factors:

• Serious criminal misconduct - conviction for intent to pervert the course of justice
• Deliberate and extended conduct that helped conceal Mrs B's improper conduct
• Significant impact on Mrs A and Mrs C who were subject to lengthy police investigations
• Respondent must have known her actions were thoroughly inappropriate as an experienced solicitor

Mitigating factors:

• Mrs B was the prime mover in the events giving rise to the conviction
• No personal benefit to the Respondent
• Full cooperation with her regulator
• Genuine remorse
• Numerous extremely positive character references
• Significant personal pressures and family circumstances
• Voluntarily ceased practice shortly after arrest