Theyakaraja Palaniandy

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

Theyakaraja Palaniandy, an unregistered barrister of Lincoln's Inn, faced three charges of professional misconduct. While practising as an Advocate and Solicitor in Malaysia, his firm failed to refund a RM335,000 client deposit held as stakeholder for an aborted land purchase; the money had been improperly kept in the office account and a refund cheque bounced. He was struck off the Malaysian roll on 13 October 2016 following a Disciplinary Committee finding on 26 April 2016 that his conduct was unbecoming. He failed to report these matters to the BSB. All three charges were found proved to the criminal standard in his absence. The tribunal expressly noted there was no allegation of dishonesty against him. By majority, he was disbarred/struck off the Register of Barristers of England and Wales, with one member favouring a lesser sanction.

Duties found breached:

• Uphold public trust in the profession
• Self-report to the regulator
• Report serious misconduct of others

Aggravating factors:

• Client suffered significant financial loss and did not recover funds
• As a partner he was jointly and severally liable and failed to make good the client's loss himself
• Failed to report the Malaysian proceedings and being struck off to the BSB

Mitigating factors:

• No allegation or finding that he acted dishonestly
• He had tried to refund the deposit (though the cheque bounced)
• He blamed his business partner for depositing client money into the office account

⚠ figures not found verbatim in the source were dropped: ["review_dishonesty_finding_cue_present"]