Peter Procopi

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

The Respondent, a solicitor admitted in 1981, was convicted at St Albans Crown Court in May 2009 of four counts of defrauding HM Revenue and sentenced to nine months imprisonment; his appeal was dismissed. The Tribunal found the offences were clearly offences of dishonesty and that he was in breach of Rules 1.01, 1.02 and 1.06 of the SCC 2007. Relying on the sentencing judge's remarks that these were acts of deliberate dishonesty and that he was already a bad solicitor, the Tribunal found this was not exceptional and applied the normal order of striking off. He was struck off the Roll and ordered to pay agreed costs of £1,277.47.

Duties found breached:

• No conflict between current clients

Aggravating factors:

• Deliberate dishonesty as found by the sentencing judge
• Prolonged criminal activity with known criminals
• Prior rebuke for bad practice in conveyancing
• Poor conveyancing activities assisted criminals in their schemes

Mitigating factors:

• No previous disciplinary sanctions recorded
• Offences related solely to the Respondent's personal taxation affairs (as advanced on his behalf)
• Previous professional record and gainful employment during the relevant period (as advanced on his behalf)