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By Jemma Slingo2021-03-08T11:55:00+00:00
A solicitor who dishonestly transferred almost £200,000 of client money for his own benefit has been struck off by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal.
Robert Alan Downie was found to have made 22 dishonest transfers amounting to £193,210 over a three-month period in 2019, when sole equity owner of Bathurst Brown & Downie LLP. According to the tribunal’s judgment, the money was moved from the firm’s client account to the office account and on to ‘unknown destinations’.
The tribunal found that Downie, admitted in 1997, had ‘benefitted directly’ from the transfers and had ‘prevaricated’ when clients challenged him about the missing funds. ‘His conduct appeared to be planned, the dishonest round sum transfers had been repeated over a period of three months and there was no indication that any of the misconduct was anything other than deliberate and calculated,’ the tribunal concluded.
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