Monday, December 23, 2013

FIVE YEAR FIDDLE : Rogue lawyers refuse to pay fines & client compensation orders, standards in legal profession at 'all time low' as Scots consumers remain unprotected by £3M a year Scottish Legal Complaints Commission

SLCC

Independent’ regulator has made no difference to poor standards in Scotland’s legal profession STRUGGLING to shake off it’s pro-lawyer, anti-client image, the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission (SLCC) published its 2012-2013 annual report last week, revealing the regulator now deals with more complaints per year. The report also reveals the SLCC’s ‘free’ mediation service, which is generating costs & fees of over £45K to mediators, is resulting in a rising numbers of complaints resolutions instead of cases going on to investigation, determination, and potential disciplinary action against rogue lawyers.

The so-called ‘independent’ regulator of lawyers created six years ago by the Scottish Government at a staggering multi-million pound cost to taxpayers which has never been paid back, also published claims it made compensation awards and fee rebates to clients who were victims of crooked law firms to clients of “over £250,000.

Claims of a feather don’t necessarily match together – SLCC 2012-2013 annual report  Figures contained in the SLCC’s own annual report reveal a very different version on the ‘over £250K compensation figure’, showing that law firms are regularly refusing or delaying to pay fines imposed on them by the regulator, forcing the SLCC to resort to costly court action when dodgy law firms & lawyers refuse to pay up to clients now turned into financial victims.

Figures in the annual report actually reveal there were 49 cases where the SLCC was forced to take recovery action against solicitors & law firms who refused to pay up after the SLCC had made compensation awards to clients.The SLCC said it’s action recovered over £72,000 of compensation for complainers in these cases but gave no further details of the cases concerned.

The SLCC said “We continue to see cases of non-compliance where practitioners fail to pay awards which have been made against them by us. We take a firm line on this and use Sheriff Officers and the Small Claims Court processes where necessary to enforce outstanding sums.” The SLCC went onto claim : “We have the full support of the Law Society of Scotland in tackling non-compliance where a solicitor refuses to pay.”

The SLCC continued “In addition, we have found that complainers sometimes have to wait a considerable length of time to receive compensation or fee rebates where a Judicial Factor or Trustee has been appointed. They may also only receive partial compensation.”

“We have raised this point with the Law Society of Scotland. Whilst we understand that other creditors’ interests need to be considered, it is essential that the complaints system incorporates effective redress mechanisms. We are concerned that in an increasing proportion of cases, complainers are at risk of not receiving full redress.”

“In addition to the risk of inadequacy of redress, we are incurring increasing costs in seeking to enforce our decisions. Since we are funded by a levy on the legal profession, these costs are borne by the profession as a whole.”

In two cases, the SLCC was critical of the Law Society’s administration of the investigation and/or its decision-making. The regulator revealed the Law Society paid a total of £500 compensation to the complainers (plus £20 towards their costs).

The SLCC also asked the Society to reconsider one of these complaints which resulted in a complaint being upheld which the Society had previously decided not to uphold. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the SLCC found that in the two other cases, the Law Society had carried out its investigations generally satisfactorily.

While the claimed improvements contained in the annual report may be welcome in some quarters, notably the Scottish Government who are in need of positive figures from it’s inept creation of the SLCC in 2008 by Kenny MacAskill, the SLCC’s statistics and rumours surrounding the identities of law firms continually subject to client complaints actually reveal some unsurprising facts :

(i) Solicitors & law firms who continually abuse clients  & consumers in complaint after complaint are using the SLCC’s perceived bias towards the profession and the regulator's lack of powers to avoid complaints investigations,

(ii) Solicitors and their ‘professional representatives & support organisations’ (aka Legal Defence Union, Law Care, Law Society etc) are manipulating paperwork, dates of legal work carried out on behalf of clients, and also the regulator’s mediation service to ensure lawyers who are subject of complaints remain in a job with a clean record, thus avoiding claims for negligence, dishonesty and sanction as a result of prosecution before the Scottish Solicitors Discipline Tribunal .

Keen to promote the image of the SLCC as ‘improved’, even though the evidence appears to show the regulator at a five year stand still, Chief Executive of the SLCC, Matthew Vickers, said “We’ve made some significant improvements in our performance this year but there is no room for complacency. Where lawyers haven’t met the standards which the public should expect, we act to put things right. Where we do make awards we follow up strongly to ensure that redress becomes reality. We believe that our trend analysis and guidance contributes to improving legal services and we look forward to continuing to work with the professional bodies to build public trust and confidence in the Scottish legal profession.”

Once hailed as a hope to clean up crooked lawyers, the SLCC achieved so little in 5 years. The SLCC also published a five year review of it’s work, which can be viewed online here : The SLCC Five Years On - Facts & Figures. Commenting on the review, Bill Brackenridge, SLCC Chair said : “The review is a good measure of progress and while there is still work to be done it clearly demonstrates the benefits of having an independent regulator. I would encourage the profession to continue to work closely with the SLCC in order to promote best practice, further reduce the number of complaints and continue to improve the reputation of the legal sector with clients, the public and stakeholders”.

In reality, the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission has moved on little since its creation in 2008. Consumers of legal services in Scotland are as unprotected now as they have been for decades under the lawyer investigates their own culture of the Law Society of Scotland.

Indeed, the Law Society of Scotland appears more in charge of regulation of its own member solicitors than ever before, leaving the SLCC as some bystander, far from innocent, and far from having the will to clean up legal services or protect consumers from the costly consistent horrors of dealing with Scotland’s legal profession.

And, as far as independence goes, the ‘independent’ regulator of complaints against Scottish solicitors, is hardly independent at all as Diary of Injustice revealed earlier this year here : A SPECIAL RELATIONSHIP : Investigation reveals Scotland’s ‘independent’ legal regulator is mired in family, business & personal links to legal profession & Law Society

The cost of this five year stand still you ask? Well, poor legal services in Scotland for one, poor client protection for another, hundreds of lawyers escaping regulation & penalties, and a whopping £3 million pounds a year to run the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission on top of the millions every year Scottish solicitors take in ill gotten gains from clients and get away with it.

So, got a complaint against a lawyer ? Well, tell us in the media about it before or during your trip to the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission. Its amazing what some attention, and little transparency can achieve these days…

MEDIATION – Far from free, and a dodge for dodgy lawyers to escape penalty

Included in the SLCC’s annual report were claims their “free mediation service is an effective early complaint resolution method with 75% success rate.”

However, a response received from the SLCC in relation to a freedom of information request made by DOI journalists revealed a slightly different story which anyone thinking of going into mediation may wish to consider :

Of the 134 cases eligible for mediation in the last year, 43 cases were settled at mediation, 14 cases were not settled at mediation, 1 case was withdrawn by the complainer, 76 cases were marked as "did not happen", which refers to the fact that the parties did not agree to go to mediation.

The SLCC were asked for statistics on the numbers of mediation outcomes accepted or rejected by complainer or solicitor. However, the SLCC claimed “There is no way of knowing this information. The outcome of the mediation process is agreed between the parties, the mediator does not suggest the settlement. Any settlements reached are confidential.”

Asked about the numbers of mediation cases sent back for investigation, the SLCC disclosed “Any cases that are not settled at mediation will be passed to a Case Investigator to begin the investigation process. In the period in question 90 cases were sent for investigation.”

In spite of claiming its mediation service to be free (to clients), the SLCC disclosed in its FOI response the total cost representing the cost of the mediator and the room hire etc amounts to £45,210.

In the period from 25/04/13 till 30/06/13 the SLCC said it had identified 3 cases which were closed following settlement at mediation. The combined costs of these cases (mediators costs and room hire) amounts to £1335.30

Commenting on the SLCC’s mediation process, a consumer affairs representative who has seen documents from a client who’s case was unsuccessful in mediation, said : “The SLCC’s mediation scheme only seems to guarantee that any lawyer who faces a complaint and who is lucky enough to end up in mediation, can drag out discussions for months, settle for much less than the client appears to have lost, and then go on to find another victim to rip off.”

54 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good to see you still on their case because one thing I am sure of is no one would be getting any of the £250,000 a year if it wasn't for your exposes of the SLCC!

Happy Christmas Peter Cherbi and team

Anonymous said...

Brilliant Journalism from the DOI Team.

The SLCC is just another wing of the Law Society of Scotland?

The SLCC will not do ANYTHING without the Law Society of Scotland's prior Instruction?

The Mediation Service is a cruel trick. Similar to the Law Society of Scotland's Sifting Panel?

Remember the Sifting Panel which was a tool used to put a thick red line through the most serious of your Heads of Complaint, by an apparently anonymous committee of two (as if it ever took place) so that it makes it even more difficult than usual to contest this unaccountable decision?

So, the Mediation Service is another tool in the Law Society's suite of weapons they employ against the poor Client Victims of crooked Scottish lawyers and pursued with evil hatred by the Law Society of Scotland?

The Law Society of Scotland (and SLCC) are twisters of the truth in order that the crooked Scottish lawyer is let of with the lightest Sanction possible and released back into the community to commit further mass crimes against the Scottish Public?

If the SLCC's claimed main point of existence is to improve the perception of the Scottish Public about crooked Scottish lawyers and the Law Society of Scotland then they are going in exactly the wrong direction?

The People of Scotland are not stupid and they can recognise a fraud when they see one?

Anonymous said...

Oh well they asked for it issuing claims such as these and then it turns out lawyers not paying and 49 cases presumably in court or whatever to recover the money

They are probably spending more to recover what they are claiming is being awarded back to clients and lawyers will be making up for it in other ways as we can all imagine I'm sure.

Keep up the good work!

Anonymous said...

Mediation is a joke especially when it is run by lawyers

Anonymous said...

Looks like FOI rubbished the annual report angle on mediation..

Anonymous said...

“The SLCC’s mediation scheme only seems to guarantee that any lawyer who faces a complaint and who is lucky enough to end up in mediation, can drag out discussions for months, settle for much less than the client appears to have lost, and then go on to find another victim to rip off.”
====================================
AN ORGANIZED CRIME GANG.

Anonymous said...

By having to go to court against lawyers who fail to pay these fines and compensation all they are doing is generating more business for lawyers who will end up well in pocket.

Anonymous said...

£3 million a year to run a lawyers quango and never hear much about anyone actually getting redress against a crooked lawyer?

Just like Police doctors etc investigating their own and no one ever gets to hear about it.

Corrupt from start to finish

Anonymous said...

"The regulator revealed the Law Society paid a total of £500 compensation to the complainers (plus £20 towards their costs)."

£20 towards their costs!!!! What a joke!

If this is the standard of 'care' offered then steer clear of all lawyers, the SLCC and of course the organization 'with a fundeamental dishonesty at its heart' - the Law Society of Scotland.

All are part of Scotland's Nationa Disgrace - a legal system akin to a 'Banana republic' according to a UN Adviser on Human Rights.

Anonymous said...

I thought the SLCC had been shut-down ages ago.

Anonymous said...

Mediation only works where the arbiter is completely independent?

The SLCC have declared that their intention is to change the perception of Scottish lawyers. However, it is not possible to achieve this by waking up each morning from the same bed?


The analogy would be where you had borrowed a sum of money from an unscrupulous underworld money lender but you are asked to believe that the hood who comes calling for your payment's every Friday night is really the good guy who is looking out for your best interests and it is better for you than dealing with the unscrupulous lender themselves?

Anonymous said...

Been going through your earlier posts on the SLCC annual report very interesting - Never before did I see them claim this £250000 figure so they must have been awarding a lot less up to now raising more questions than answers

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...

I thought the SLCC had been shut-down ages ago.
24 December 2013 00:47
================================
They specialize in shutting down complaints, their remit.

Anonymous said...

The Law Society of Scotland say much the same in their annual report each year.

In fact the SLCC's version of how good they are with complaints and how improvements will be made is almost verbatim the original LSoS line over the years.

Anonymous said...

Havent seen much in the press about this.

I suppose even the lawyer sympathetic newspapers (very easy to spot,low circulation <10K a day,hopefully about to go bust and wont be missed)got tired of the SLCC spin but there will always be someone willing to give them a good nod in the hope of becoming their new media dahling with a bent expenses account to match!

Anonymous said...

As things stand the SLCC failure in regulation is a reflection on those who created it (Kenny MacAskill) and those who go around shoving it in the face of anyone who tells the truth that it is just a cover up commission for the Law Society and crooked lawyers.

Anonymous said...

They make a bold claim of winning £250K for clients and then when you go and read the actual details in the report it transpires the SLCC are having to recover the money from lawyers who as you rightly point out are refusing to pay up.

What does this say about how lawyers view the SLCC when they are refusing to pay fines or compensation to clients?

Clearly they dont give a * about the SLCC and just think of all the complaints the SLCC dismiss each year before they are even make it to complaint stage!

Enlightened said...

Merry Christmas to Diary of Injustice and for all you have done for everyone this year :)

Anonymous said...

Self Regulation means there is no application of justice, no fairness based on evidence. Self regulation means that injustice is legal and withdrawing legal representation is legal. Apply these principles to armed robbery would mean the Police let the robbers of the hook to rob again. But of course the legalized robbers the SLCC and Law Society act in secret, there is no law enforcement, only recycled crooked lawyers.

Diary of Injustice said...

Season's Greetings to Diary of Injustice readers and all those who are victims of injustice.

For those suffering in silence ... tell the world about it, helping to protect yourselves and others who may fall victim to those who profit from turning innocent people into victims.

Hopefully 2014 will bring a better year for some and more pressure for reforms to self regulation, the justice system and transparency in the courts & judiciary.

Anonymous said...

Someone at the Law Society told me there is a big complaint into the SLCC about a certain Kelso lawyer you know all about and there were many stories in the Scotsman about him years ago being a crook.

Another cover up in the offing?

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...
They make a bold claim of winning £250K for clients and then when you go and read the actual details in the report it transpires the SLCC are having to recover the money from lawyers who as you rightly point out are refusing to pay up.

What does this say about how lawyers view the SLCC when they are refusing to pay fines or compensation to clients?

Clearly they dont give a * about the SLCC and just think of all the complaints the SLCC dismiss each year before they are even make it to complaint stage!

24 December 2013 15:35
ddddddddddddddddddddd:d

WHY WOULD crooked Scottish lawyers pay-up fines and compensation awarded against them by the SLCC, when for years they have not bothered to pay any SSDT fines and compensation in the knowledge that both the SSDT & the Law Society of Scotland never pursued them and let them off with it?

Anonymous said...

I will tell you more about my own experience with this mediation after christmas.For now I just want to say mediation was a waste of time we were blocked from saying a lot of the things that our former solicitor did to us and it was clear all along our former solicitor was using the mediation process as a delaying tactic to prevent our complaint being investigated within the time limits the SLCC makes for investigating complaints.

I always found the SLCC to be pro lawyer as you say in your article they are certainly not pro consumer and I imagine a lot of other people have gone through the same as us.I wish I had known about this blog earlier.

Anonymous said...

Mediation!!! There is a web-site describing how a client offered to sit round the table with his lawyer to discuss his advice as a Troubleshooter appointed by the LSS, This lawyer a lecturer in law at a university and the senior partner of a firm that advertised on their own web-site that" they preferred to mediate rather than go through the stress and trauma of court" refused to meet with the client this "refusal" was approved by the LSS and SLCC so much for MEDIATION.!!!!

Anonymous said...

MEDIATION : It involves an independent, impartial person helping two or more individuals or groups reach a solution that's acceptable to everyone?


As the SLCC can, in no normal thinking person's mind, be considered to be impartial, then the process utilised by the SLCC cannot be MEDIATION?

Instead, it is a method whereby the client victim is tricked into entering into a process, where the objective of two of the parties to it is to side with what the crooked Scottish lawyer wants to achieve as well as stalling for time, trivialising the complaint and in general putting undue pressure on the victim to settle for an insultingly low figure?

It is tantamount to a crime?

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...
I will tell you more about my own experience with this mediation after christmas.For now I just want to say mediation was a waste of time we were blocked from saying a lot of the things that our former solicitor did to us and it was clear all along our former solicitor was using the mediation process as a delaying tactic to prevent our complaint being investigated within the time limits the SLCC makes for investigating complaints.

I always found the SLCC to be pro lawyer as you say in your article they are certainly not pro consumer and I imagine a lot of other people have gone through the same as us.I wish I had known about this blog earlier.

24 December 2013 19:34
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Time Limits, don't start me off on SLCC Time Limits.

My case has been ongoing at the SLCC for years!

Yes Years!

I bet my case is not recorded on their precious statistics?

The SLCC use time limits as another hurdle for the Client victim to get over. (another excuse for them to strike-out your valid complaint)

Notice how the crooked Scottish lawyer does not have to abide by these arbitrary time limits?

Also, the SLCC and the Law Society Of Scotland are happy to completely ignore these time limits if it suits them to do so.

Another example of a SHAM organisation?

Anonymous said...

The paradox is that lawyers are there to enforce rights. For a member of the public to have rights there has to be action for example the Police arresting violent to as they say 'keep people safe'.

But lawyers deny members of the public rights against their crooked colleagues so it is prudent to avoid lawyers as much as possible. You cannot get bitten if you keep a safe distance. So many people get ruined by lawyers because access to justice is non existent. It is a pity they have to go through the legal hell wringer to realize there is no compensation and no complaints system. The SLCC and Law Society believe their own lies of that I am convinced.

Anonymous said...

By coincidence I heard today of a long story about how the SLCC messed someone about on a complaint for a full year before telling them they were time barred.Seems to fly in the face of their claims in the annual report no one bothered to cover apart from the Law Society huffing along to the press about it

Anonymous said...

What makes the SLCC so certain that they will be successful in recovering compensation and fines from crooked Scottish lawyers in a Court in Scotland?

It cannot be based on their success rate in court against crooked Scottish lawyers?

Is this yet another disingenuous faux pas propaganda trick to make their statistics look better? If so, this is really scraping the barrel of decency and says it all really?

If the SLCC are a quasi-Judicial body with teeth, then they should not be wasting money chasing crooked Scottish lawyers through court?

This is catching them out making their deliberate mistake (i.e. they go through the motions of raising actions against these crooked Scottish lawyers and then after interminable delay, where nothing happens, they throw their hands up in the air and then say to the Client Victim, we can do no more. We have tried to make them pay but we were not successful, so you will just have to forget about it....?

What the SLCC should be doing if they were a REAL REGULATOR, is simply sending the crooked Scottish lawyer an invoice for the said sum and giving them 7 days to pay in full and if they do not pay then they will be charged a penalty fee for every day that they fail to comply with the law (remember, these are lawyers who should know better!!!!) plus an administration fee to pay for the inconvenience?

If the crooked Scottish lawyer then continues their long standing tradition of ignoring the law then they should be STRUCK - OFF?

As Alexander The Meercat would say, 'Simples'?

Maybe this way a 'REAL REGULATOR' (not the SLCC) would very quickly get justice for the victims of crooked Scottish lawyers and at the same time get rid of most of the crooks and by doing so & start to rid the profession of their appallingly low reputation?

Anonymous said...

Interesting blog.I am not surprised there is so much trouble in the world of lawyers investigating themselves.They are allowed to get on with and get away with it because of so many friends in high places ie politicians and the judges who you have now broken down a little with all this debate about their interests.

Keep up the trouble

Anonymous said...

A complaint I made to the SLCC about our solicitor was put into mediation after a lot of persuasion from their complaints team.This is not what I originally wanted to happen and all we got was a long delay and the solicitor telling everyone the case against him was closed and we were liars.The fact is a lot of money went missing from my parents estate which the solicitor used to fund his lifestyle and this has not been paid back and the SLCC are now dithering whether to investigate or kick it out after the mediation delay.I do not recommend anyone goes to mediation because it is just a con and the solicitor gets a lot more out of it than we or you ever will and please take this advice from someone who has actually been through it.

Anonymous said...

There is no complaints system, this is the brutal reality. Anyone who has tried using it knows I am right.

Anonymous said...

Is this not just a predictable exercise in generating even more work for the lawyers?

Why don't the SLCC use non-lawyer mediators and then let's see the outcomes?

Anonymous said...

Pro lawyer is right on for this outfit and their dodgy press releases.

Did the Law Society write it?

Anonymous said...

Well done.Totally blows away any credibility their mediation service has and (no offence intended) makes one wonder what kind of mug actually agrees to go into mediation when the odds are clearly stacked against clients.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...

Good to see you still on their case because one thing I am sure of is no one would be getting any of the £250,000 a year if it wasn't for your exposes of the SLCC!

Happy Christmas Peter Cherbi and team

23 December 2013 19:45

To be honest I doubt the £250K claim.They say one thing in their press release and the annual report reads quite differently.

All academic really as no one with any brains trusts self regulation of lawyers covering up for each other.

Anonymous said...

Another one here with a bad experience of mediation - basically the solicitor was running the show and about half of the activities of our solicitor we put into the complaint disappeared and after months wasted it is now back to be investigated Am assuming there is zero chance of anything being done by the slcc

Anonymous said...

A big thank you to Mr Cherbi and his Team at DOI for all of your courageous and heartfelt help by exposing the rampant criminality of people who should know better.

As Pharrell would say, 'Happiness is the Truth'


So, to all the thousands of victims of nasty crooked Scottish lawyers I say put a big smile on your face and know that you have nothing to fear by telling the TRUTH to the DOI, as there can be only one truth.

Here's to you and your family for a truthful and smiling 2014 as you finally get justice in Scotland

Anonymous said...

My SLCC case has been ongoing since 2010 with no realistic possibility of it ever being resolved...

Anonymous said...

You have really opened my eyes about Scotland and your legal system.
What a mess.
Do you think it can ever be repaired?

Anonymous said...

What I cannot fathom is that victims of crooked Scottish lawyers are still going to the SLCC when it is as clear as your empty bank balance that they are working in favour of the crooked Scottish lawyer and are leading the victims up the proverbial garden path.

Anonymous said...

Why not more of these headlines in Scotland when the lawyers are doing just as much thieving

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10550841/Coroner-stole-2m-from-clients-to-fund-lavish-lifestyle.html

Coroner stole £2m from clients to fund lavish lifestyle
Solicitor and county coroner Alan Crickmore funded a lavish lifestyle by stealing from clients including a war veteran who came to the UK after fighting for the Polish army against the Nazis

By Patrick Sawer

10:05PM GMT 04 Jan 2014

For years Alan Crickmore had looked after the business affairs of dozens of families, including the extensive estate of farmland and rural properties built up by the Goodwins.

Such was their faith in the solicitor of 30 years’ experience that they, like many of his clients, had come to regard him as a family friend.

Crickmore’s standing in the community had been enhanced by the fact that, as well as being a trusted solicitor, he was also the county coroner, one of the oldest public offices in the land.

So when the Goodwins discovered that instead of carefully managing their affairs he had in fact stolen nearly £900,000 from their father Kenneth’s Herefordshire estate, the shock was devastating.

Now they, and other families whose assets were plundered by Crickmore to fund his own lavish lifestyle, have been left asking how this distinguished pillar of the community managed to get away with it for so long.

Mr Goodwin’s son, Ian, told The Telegraph: “What Alan Crickmore did had a devastating impact on our family. We considered him to be a friend, yet he betrayed our trust. My mother has still not really recovered from his betrayal. It hit her very hard.

“How on earth was he able to do what he did so easily and get away with it for such a long time?”

In the words of the police officers who investigated the case, Crickmore used his clients’ assets as his own “personal piggy bank”.

The 57-year-old solicitor siphoned off hundreds of thousands of pounds from individual clients’ accounts to pay for cruises, restaurant meals, expensive wines and champagne receptions, in what prosecutors described as one of the “most callous and brutal breach of trust” they had seen.

Crickmore was eventually sentenced to eight years in prison for stealing £2  million from his elderly and vulnerable clients over a 13-year period. Police discovered that he had used his position as executor of his clients’ wills to divert proceeds from their estates to his own bank accounts, taking money that they had left for relations and friends in their wills. He also stole from other personal and office accounts to which he had access.

Indeed his fraudulent activities – one of the most serious breaches of professional standards to hit the legal profession – might have carried on unchecked, had it not been for the intervention of one sharp-eyed auditor.

In January 2010, shortly after he began going through Crickmore’s books for the first time, the auditor spotted something surprising. The firm had outstanding “loans” to two clients, amounting to £200,000.

Shocked by what he had discovered at Crickmore’s chaotic offices in Cheltenham, the auditor not only refused to sign off the books until the money was returned to the clients’ accounts, but also reported the matter to the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA), which opened an investigation.

This culminated in Crickmore’s suspension in December 2010, and, the following month, he was arrested by Gloucestershire police.

Crickmore, who drove a Jaguar with a personalised HMC number plate (for Her Majesty’s Coroner), initially denied any wrongdoing.

It was only later that he admitted 16 counts of theft, seven counts of fraud by abuse of position and one count of fraud, carried out between 1999 and 2011.

Due to a legal loophole, however, he was able to keep drawing his £60,000-a-year salary as coroner for Gloucestershire until he formally resigned from his position on Nov 1 last year, shortly before the start of the criminal trial against him.

Anonymous said...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10550841/Coroner-stole-2m-from-clients-to-fund-lavish-lifestyle.html

Gloucestershire county council had been unable to sack Crickmore as coroner because he was a judicial officer, independent of political control.

During the police’s two-and-a-half year investigation, which involved as many as 50 officers, detectives discovered that Crickmore, from St Helens, in Merseyside, had stolen a total of £1,985,097 from his clients’ accounts. Police said most of the money has been impossible to trace and will never be returned to its rightful owners.

In one particularly shocking case Crickmore took thousands of pounds from the estate of Jozef Dziuma, a Second World War veteran who came to the UK in 1947 after fighting for the Polish army against the Nazis.

Mr Dziuma had used Crickmore to write his will and act as his sole executor to his £56,000 estate. This included a £5,000 bequest to his GP and around £20,000 to his brother in Poland.

After Mr Dziuma’s death in 1998, police found that Crickmore had stolen more than £28,000 in “charges” from the estate. But he had made no attempt to trace either Mr Dziuma’s brother or his GP, neither of whom received a penny.

One of the largest thefts was from Kenneth Goodwin. On his death in July 1997 Crickmore became a trustee of Mr Goodwin’s estate, which included houses and tracts of Herefordshire farmland. Through his position as trust administrator he was able to steal £894,442 from the estate, leaving Mr Goodwin’s widow Marjorie and son Ian with only their home, just outside Hereford, and a small number of other properties and assets.

To make matters worse Crickmore went on to claim £13,478 in false charges for handling the affairs of Mr Goodwin’s other son, Martin, who died in July 2009 without a will. The legitimate costs should have been only £1,447.

Anonymous said...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10550841/Coroner-stole-2m-from-clients-to-fund-lavish-lifestyle.html

Ian Goodwin, 55, who runs what remains of the land and property rental firm left by his father, from his home outside Hereford, said: “He stole thousands and thousands of pounds from my father’s estate and from lots of other of his clients. He just took what he wanted.

“What someone like Crickmore, in his position as a solicitor and a coroner, did to people who trusted him was appalling.”

Police were only able to unravel much of Crickmore’s lavish spending of clients’ assets after painstakingly examining his bank and credit card statements.

They discovered that between 2005 and 2010 he spent more than £45,000 on restaurant bills, £33,500 on holidays, £16,874 on wine and nearly £23,000 on hotels.

Crickmore also spent more than £12,000 on a number of luxury cruises, including the QE2, on which he travelled “Grill” – or first class – for two weeks in August 2006, with his wife Susan and their two sons, at a cost of £5,450.

In March 2007 the solicitor threw a champagne reception and four-course lunch for 12 guests at the Cheltenham Gold Cup, to celebrate his silver wedding anniversary. The event cost £5,076 and Crickmore paid for it with a “loan” from Judith Lorman, a family friend. She neither knew about the loan nor was invited to the lunch.

Sentencing him at Southwark Crown Court on Nov 28, Judge Anthony Leonard QC told Crickmore: “I have had difficulty thinking of such dishonest conduct committed by a practising solicitor over such a long period and with so many devastated victims.

“You used the money to maintain a standard of living that far exceeded your income.”

Crickmore faces being struck off as a solicitor by the SRA at a hearing next April, for taking unfair advantage of clients, misappropriating client funds for his own benefit and transferring and withdrawing money from client accounts without permission.

Edward Henry, Crickmore’s defence counsel, said: “He has lived with this secret and with the denial of the reality of this situation for many years and it has taken its toll.”

A number of Crickmore’s victims have sought to recover their losses from the Solicitors’ Compensation Fund, which has so far paid out £116,645 in compensation.

The Goodwins are still waiting to hear how much of their losses they will be able to recoup. What they are unlikely to ever regain is their sense of trust.

Anonymous said...

Thanks to all of the team at the DOI for brilliant, honest reporting throughout 2013.

Here's hoping you will shine the light of Truth on the many crooks who are allowed to flourish within Scotland in 2014

Thanks again for doing the right thing.

Anonymous said...

It is a sad indictment of the SLCC when crooked Scottish lawyers have declared open warfare on them?

It is even more ironic since the SLCC is being run by the Law Society of Scotland, like the hand that works the ventriloquist's dummy?

Although having said that, the SLCC is a total SHAM of an organisation that has zero trust in it by all parties (including the Law Society of Scotland). Thereby, the Scottish Government will be forced by the Law Society of Scotland to return the whole Regulation of crooked Scottish lawyers (conduct & service) back to them, so that they will no longer need to hide behind the SLCC and they will be back to their overt persecution of the victims of Scottish crooked lawyers?

Anonymous said...

After all these years of exposing regulation of lawyers to be a fraud and this latest one about the pitiful SLCC your readers may be interested in the following bbc proggie to be aired next week

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03pzsp5
Lawyers Behaving Badly
2014
Duration: 30 minutes
Scotland's legal system is built on a code of conduct which demands honesty, trust and integrity. But what happens when things go wrong? Are solicitors failing to bring justice against their own?
Samantha Poling investigates a regulation system which clients say favours the profession rather than the consumer, and goes undercover to investigate solicitors making a mockery of the system.

Anonymous said...

Really the BBC are finally looking into this?Looking forward to playing spot the liar with the Law Society/SLCC mob

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...
After all these years of exposing regulation of lawyers to be a fraud and this latest one about the pitiful SLCC your readers may be interested in the following bbc proggie to be aired next week

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03pzsp5
Lawyers Behaving Badly
2014
Duration: 30 minutes
Scotland's legal system is built on a code of conduct which demands honesty, trust and integrity. But what happens when things go wrong? Are solicitors failing to bring justice against their own?
Samantha Poling investigates a regulation system which clients say favours the profession rather than the consumer, and goes undercover to investigate solicitors making a mockery of the system.

8 January 2014 21:40
?????????????????

This must have been the programme the Law Society of Scotland were trying to block with their 'D' Notice?

Typical crooks!

Anonymous said...

Hopefully it will be a good report if the bbc have done their homework unless the Law Society have prepared the script or the usual suspects appear..

Anonymous said...

I'm hearing that the usual threats are being banded about. Poor Leslie Cumming must be having flash-backs?

Anonymous said...

'honesty, trust and integrity'

The Law Society of Scotland gleefully practices the exact opposite of the above on a daily basis?

Anonymous said...

sauna pics are currently subject to a blackmail investigation so dont expect any papers to take them on but you may be interested to know some of those in the frame are alleged to have paid up

maybe the public should know who these people are dot dot dot

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...
sauna pics are currently subject to a blackmail investigation so dont expect any papers to take them on but you may be interested to know some of those in the frame are alleged to have paid up

maybe the public should know who these people are dot dot dot

14 January 2014 14:45
eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek

Just add this extracurricular activity to the Register of Interests sheet...