Peter Collins Maku-Kemi

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

Peter Collins Maku-Kemi, an employee/consultant solicitor at Jesuis Solicitors, faced allegations of misleading the First-tier and Upper Tribunals in two immigration matters. Allegation 1.1 was withdrawn. For Client 2, he submitted that a Ugandan Penal Code reporting offence had been enacted into law when it had not, and repeated this before the Upper Tribunal. For Client 3, he misrepresented the date the client received a Home Office Notice to obtain an out-of-time appeal. The Tribunal found Allegations 1.2 and 1.3 proved, including the aggravating feature of dishonesty (applying the Ivey test), rejecting his claims of mere recklessness and reliance on a colleague. No exceptional circumstances were found to avoid striking off. He was struck off and ordered to pay costs of £15,000 (reduced from £42,600 claimed).

Duties found breached:

• Honesty
• Integrity
• Uphold public trust in the profession
• Act in the client's best interests

Aggravating factors:

• Dishonesty found proved on three occasions of misleading the First-tier and Upper Tribunals
• Misled courts in asylum/immigration matters affecting vulnerable clients
• Attempted to attribute blame to colleague PM and his assistant
• Inconsistent and evolving accounts; found to be an unimpressive witness lacking insight

Mitigating factors:

• No previous disciplinary history
• Admitted the factual matrix and breaches of principle (denied only dishonesty)
• Relative inexperience at the material time (rejected by Tribunal as exceptional)
• Family/financial pressures and ill-health (rejected as exceptional)