NO NAME, NO SHAME: Scottish Legal Complaints Commission will protect identifies of rogue solicitors & dishonest law firms - as legal quango confirms limited publication of complaint cases

Scots legal regulator refuses to name corrupt lawyers. DECISIONS relating to investigations by the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission (SLCC) on complaints about corrupt solicitors - are to be published for the first time in Scotland later this month.

However, lawyers who regularly swindle their clients and taxpayers can breathe a sigh of relief - as the SLCC confirmed it will not publish the names of corrupt lawyers or their law firms in any ‘anonymised’ decisions to be published every few months on the legal regulator’s website.

The move by the pro-lawyer SLCC to publish censored details of legal complaints in Scotland - comes several years after the Legal Ombudsman equivalent in England & Wales began to publish  Public interest cases & case summaries and Ombudsman decision data identifying the number of decisions against named law firms in the rest of the UK.

This imbalance leaves consumers of legal services in Scotland at a disadvantage - as Scots are not able to find out complaints histories of their solicitors or law firms, while consumers in England & Wales are able to make a more informed decision on which solicitor to use.

In a statement released to the media, the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission claimed it cannot identify corrupt or crooked lawyers - due to sections of the Legal Profession and Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 2007 - inserted at the behest of the legal profession – which prohibit anyone from the SLCC identifying a rogue solicitor or law firm.

David Buchanan-Cook, head of oversight at the SLCC, explained: "While we hope that this will also demonstrate better accountability and the transparency of our complaint handling process, we also needed to balance that transparency with our duty to protect the confidentiality of complainers and practitioners. Unlike our counterparts south of the border, our legislation prevents us from 'naming and shaming' individual solicitors or firms without their express permission unless the complaint is unusual and it is in the public interest to publish. Very few, if any, inadequate service complaints meet those criteria.

"For these reasons, we have chosen to publish anonymous complaint information in the form of very short case studies and have, as far as possible, removed any identifying features. As such, the complaint information is only a brief summary of the information made available to the Determination Committee. In making decisions, consideration will have been given to specific facts and circumstances which, again for reasons of confidentiality, cannot be provided publicly.

"We hope, however, that the published information is sufficient to provide general guidance to the profession and that it will help promote best practice in the provision of legal services."

Coinciding with the new service, the SLCC is launching a quarterly ‘Law Society’ style newsletter specifically aimed at providing practical and topical support for client relations managers.

The newsletter – seen as a move to bring the SLCC back into self regulation fold after years of claiming ‘independence’ - will contain regular best practice features, guest articles, prior notice of future CPD events and will provide comment on some of the trends and features emerging from the previous quarter’s published decisions.

It is worth noting the latest window dressing developments at the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission come after coverage in the mass media of several high profile cases involving corrupt lawyers dodging criminal prosecution for fraud and provision of dishonest legal services which often result in substantial and unrecoverable financial losses to clients.

A BBC Scotland investigation Lawyers Behaving Badly – exposed serious flaws in the world of solicitors self regulation where lawyers investigate their own.

And, a recent investigation of the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission revealed the Law Society controlled quango is staffed mainly by families, friends & associates of solicitors, reported here: 'Independent' Scots legal watchdog consists of solicitors’ husbands, wives, sons, daughters, cousins, friends, & employers.

Previous media investigations, reports and coverage of issues relating to the SLCC can be found here: Scottish Legal Complaints Commission - A history of pro-lawyer regulation.

LAWYERS BEHAVING BADLY:

An investigation by BBC’s Lawyers Behaving Badly featured among others, the case of John O’Donnell – a serial rogue solicitor who has featured in numerous media reports.

The programme - aired in January 2014 to much consternation of the Law Society, certain parts of the legal profession and elderly aggrieved legal hacks – revealed staggering differences in how dishonesty is tolerated in the Scottish legal profession in comparison to cases in England & Wales – where dishonesty is automatically a striking off offence.

Alistair Cockburn, Chair, Scottish Solicitors Discipline Tribunal. Featured in the investigation was the Scottish Solicitors Discipline Tribunal (SSDT) Chairman’s attitude towards solicitors accused of dishonesty in their representation of clients legal affairs. During the programme, it became clear that dishonesty among lawyers in Scotland is treated less severely, compared to how English regulators treat dishonesty.

Sam Poling asks: The Scottish Solicitors’ Discipline Tribunal hears all serious conduct cases against solicitors. Last year they struck off nine of them. But is this robust enough?

Alistair Cockburn Chairman, Scottish solicitors discipline tribunal replies: It is robust in the sense that it doesn’t just give convictions on the basis that somebody’s brought before us charged by the Law Society.  We are mindful, particularly when reminded of the lay members, of a duty to the public.

One is always concerned when there is deception but you can have a situation where solicitors simply lose their place. They make false representations in order to improve their client’s position, not necessarily their own. And you would take that into account in deciding what the penalty was but there’s no suggestion that such conduct wasn’t deemed to be professional as conduct. 

Sam Poling: So there are levels of dishonesty which sit comfortably with you, satisfactorily with you?

Alistair Cockburn: No it’s not a question of saying sitting comfortably with me.  I’ve told you…

Sam Poling: OK that you would accept?

Alistair Cockburn: No I’d be concerned on any occasion that a solicitor was guilty of any form of dishonesty.  One has to assess the extent to which anyone suffered in consequence of that dishonesty.  You have to take into consideration the likelihood of re-offending and then take a decision.  But you make it sound as if it’s commonplace.  It isn’t.  Normally dishonesty will result in striking-off.

English QC’s agree ‘dishonesty’ is a striking off offence. The SSDT Chairman’s comments on dishonesty compared starkly with the comments of the English QC’s who said dishonesty was undoubtedly a striking off offence.

Andrew Hopper QC: “I cant get my head round borrowing in this context. Somebody explain to me how you can borrow something without anyone knowing about it. That’s just taking.”

Andrew Boon Professor of Law, City University, London: “They actually say in the judgement they would have struck him off but the client hadn't complained.”

Andrew Hopper QC “We’re dealing with a case of dishonesty and that affects the reputation of the profession. I would have expected this to result in striking off.”

Andrew Boon, Professor of Law: “The critical thing is the risk factor. If somebody has been dishonest once the likelihood is that they are going to be dishonest again unless they’re stopped.”

As Sam Poling went on to report: “but he [O’Donnell] wasn't stopped. The tribunal simply restricted his license so that he had to work under the supervision of another solicitor.”

Clients of Scots solicitors miss out on ‘right to know’ as UK Legal Ombudsman moves to name & shame ‘crooked lawyers’ in England & Wales

Legal Ombudsman for England & Wales now operating naming & shaming policy. CROOKED LAWYERS operating in England & Wales who are being investigated over complaints from clients and law firms who are considered ‘serial offenders’ in their poor treatment of clients & consumers could now be publicly identified by the Legal Ombudsman (LeO), even if the complaint is yet to be decided, according to an announcement made earlier this week by the independent regulator of complaints against the legal profession south of the border.

The policy, popularly known as ‘naming & shaming’ has taken well over a year for the LeO to implement after several consultations took place amid bitter arguments and veiled threats from the legal profession, who are worried consumers may end up seeing a different ‘warts, complaints, swindling, corruption & all’ view of lawyers other than the carefully manicured image projected by the Law Society and the UK’s legal services industry.

The LeO originally announced in November 2011 they would be going ahead with ‘naming & shaming’ in early 2012, reported by Diary of Injustice here : Scots to be ‘kept in dark’ on details of crooked lawyers while Legal Ombudsman’s ‘naming & shaming’ policy ‘will protect’ consumers in England & Wales

Earlier this week, Legal Ombudsman issued a statement & media release on its website confirming the naming & shaming policy is now operational : “As of 1 April 2012 we are collating names of lawyers and law firms subject to complaints resolved by an ombudsman's decision. Any data collected will be made publicly available at the end of July 2012 and then subsequently every quarter.”

The statement (pdf) went on to say : “In November last year, the Office for Legal Complaints (OLC), which is the board of the Legal Ombudsman, announced its decision that it is right to publish the names of lawyers in some specific circumstances, in line with the powers given to the Board under the Legal Services Act 2007.”

“The policy – which starts from 1 April 2012 – is to identify lawyers or law firms that are the subject of complaints in two different ways. The first of these is to publish, once a quarter, a table that summarises the number of ombudsman decisions each legal entity has been the subject of, what the outcome was (so remedy or no remedy), and the area of law in each case. The first quarterly information will be available on the Legal Ombudsman website in late July.”

The second is where there is a pattern of complaints, or circumstances where it is in the public interest to publish the details of a lawyer or law firm, then, pending approval from the Board, the Legal Ombudsman will publish this information immediately. This is regardless of whether there has been an ombudsman decision on the case.”

Liz France, Chair of the Legal Ombudsman’s board, said: “After careful reflection, based on the consultations we undertook, I am confident that the approach we are taking strikes the right balance. It meets our aim to be open in all we do while not providing information which is excessive to the purposes of publication – protecting consumers of legal services from detriment and helping to improving standards of service.”

Further information is available on the Legal Ombudsman’s consultations page HERE. Diary of Injustice reproted on the Legal Ombudsman’s consultation over naming & shaming here : Legal Ombudsman moving to name & shame crooked lawyers in England & Wales, crooked Scottish solicitors records to remain protected by secrecy for now

Consumer group Which? have previously given their backing to the Legal Ombudsman’s plans to identify crooked lawyers in England & Wales. A spokesperson for Which? told Diary of Injustice last year : “Which? strongly supports the principle of the LeO publishing complaints data under a strict and published policy , including in some circumstances the name of the law firm concerned. We set out our position in our response to the LeO consultation (page 51: opening up regulatory data)) pointing out that it is the expectation of Government that complaints handling bodies are as transparent as possible.”

Speaking on the LeO’s plans to publish complaints data & the identities of law firms who perform poorly for clients, Elisabeth Davies, Chair of the Legal Services Consumer Panel (LSCP), said last year : “Research shows that UK consumers are now leaving well over 100 million comments online every year about their experience with businesses across the economy. Lawyers cannot escape this welcome emergence of consumer power, but instead should seek and then use such feedback to improve the service they offer.

She continued : “The courts will decide the fate of the Solicitors From Hell website. However, such websites fill a vacuum that exists because official complaints data about lawyers is not publically available to help consumers identify good quality lawyers. The Panel will continue to push the Legal Ombudsman to name those law firms who regularly provide poor service.”

The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) also supports the Legal Ombudsman’s naming & shaming policy. The OFT stated in its submission (pdf) to the LeO’s consultation : “We appreciate that you need to balance the interests of consumers with the reputational impact on firms and individual lawyers. However, the OFT remains firmly of the view that the publication of named complaints data could incentivise legal service providers, due to reputational considerations, to maintain and/or improve the quality of service they provide to consumers.We believe that essential data would include:

* The number of complaints made against individual firms and lawyers;
* The nature of those complaints and placing them into categories to help see if a pattern develops;
* The ratio of complaints upheld against an individual firm or lawyer;
* Areas of law where complaints tend to focus;
* Which aspects of service the complaints tend to focus; and
* Whether the complaints tend to come from private or publically funded cases.

Diary of Injustice has been following the Name and Shame debate in England & Wales and it should not be forgotten the Law Society of England & Wales has, at rumoured costs of up to half a million pounds, used the courts to silence private individuals efforts to set up websites naming & shaming ‘crooked lawyers’, the most famous of which was Rick Kordowski’s Solicitors from Hell website.

While consumers of legal services in England & Wales are expected to benefit from the tough stance on naming & shaming taken by Adam Sampson, the Legal Ombudsman, there are no equivalent statutory moves being made in Scotland by the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission (SLCC) to name & shame many of Scotland’s ‘serial rogues’ from the legal profession who regularly get away with a slap on the wrist or secret shady deals done between the SLCC, Law Society of Scotland & the Legal Defence Union.

Even though the SLCC, Law Society of Scotland or the Faculty of Advocates currently refuse to name & shame their serial offenders who fail their clients, there are other routes, as Diary of Injustice reported earlier this year, here : NAME & SHAME YOUR CROOKED LAWYER : Have you been treated roughly by your solicitor ? It’s time to talk, rate, review, name & shame YOUR crooked lawyer

No one from the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission or the Scottish Government was available to comment on the lack of public information available about Scottish solicitors’ regulatory history, however a former Law Society Council member speaking to Diary of Injustice indicated any moves to name & shame ‘crooked lawyers’ in Scotland “will be fiercely resisted by the Law Society of Scotland”.

The insider also suggested any moves made in petitions to the Scottish Parliament or pleas to the Scottish Government to amend legislation to enable the SLCC to identify solicitors who are the subject of complaints “will be lobbied against by the Law Society of Scotland”.

THOSE WHO KEEP COMPLAINTS AGAINST SCOTS SOLICITORS HIDDEN FROM PUBLIC VIEW :

Misplaced trust with complaints : Philip Yelland. Philip Yelland, the Law Society of Scotland’s director of standards, previously director of regulation and before that head of the Law Society’s “Client Relations Office” has been in charge of regulating crooked lawyers in Scotland for over TWENTY YEARS yet from Penman to the present and beyond, most crooked Scottish lawyers have either received a slap on the wrist or no punishment at all while the client ends up financially ruined and excluded from the courts to make sure justice can never be done. Would you trust anyone like this with your complaint ? Make sure you use the media first before trusting the Law Society or SLCC with your lawyer problems.

Law complaints regulators like the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission & Law Society of Scotland turn out to be client-haters rather than consumer protectors. Consumers, clients & readers may get a lot further in their complaints and obtain a lot more satisfaction from a media investigation of their crooked lawyers long before the Law Society of Scotland or blundering Scottish Legal Complaints Commission get round to putting pen to paper. Put simply, its more difficult for so-called regulators like the Law Society of Scotland or SLCC to let a crooked lawyer off the hook if they have already been in the newspapers a few times. Its also more difficult to let a crooked lawyer off the hook if, as usually turns out to be the case, the media reveal they have been ripping off many of their clients, not just you, or someone you know

If you have a story about a crooked lawyer, contact Diary of Injustice via scottishlawreporters@gmail.com with full details of what happened, how you were treated and what you have done about it so far.

NAME & SHAME YOUR CROOKED LAWYER : Have you been treated roughly by your solicitor ? It’s time to talk, rate, review, name & shame YOUR crooked lawyer

Naming & shaming a crooked lawyer is one of the best ways to warn consumers of the perils of using lawyers who fail to disclose their history to clients. IN response to last year’s court sponsored takedowns of websites such as Solicitors from Hell & others across the UK & Ireland where clients of “crooked lawyers” had used the online ratings sites to publish and even debate their usually bad experiences with their solicitors, it is very clear that in 2012, consumers who are ripped off by their legal representatives or those who know of a story involving a crooked lawyer ripping off members of the public should follow the Legal Ombudsman (LeO) naming & shaming policy, by using this year to OUT those lawyers who fail their clients, whether by negligence, corruption or multiple mistakes in an effort to ensure all consumers are protected from the rogue elements of the legal profession, whether in Scotland, England Wales, or Ireland.

Naming & shaming is terribly easy to do. Make the choice to protect yourself & others, by doing it.

If you have experience of a crooked lawyer, or if you know of anyone who has experience of a crooked lawyer, wherever you are, you can help protect yourself, or help others by ensuring the details of the story are fully published in the media while also making a complaint to bodies such as the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission (SLCC) and the Law Society of Scotland.

Law complaints regulators like the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission & Law Society of Scotland turn out to be client-haters rather than consumer protectors. Consumers, clients & readers may get a lot further in their complaints and get a lot more satisfaction from a media investigation of their crooked lawyers long before the Law Society or blundering SLCC get round to putting pen to paper (usually more so in an effort to protect the lawyer before protecting the client). Put simply, its more difficult for so-called regulators like the Law Society of Scotland or SLCC to let a crooked lawyer off the hook if they have already been in the newspapers a few times. Its also more difficult to let a crooked lawyer off the hook if, as usually turns out to be the case, the media reveal they have been ripping off many of their clients, not just you, or someone you know.

If you have a story about a crooked lawyer, contact Diary of Injustice via scottishlawreporters@gmail.com with full details of what happened, how you were treated and what you have done about it so far.

Publishing your experiences at the hands of crooks in the legal world will protect you, and protect others, and will also help shame some of those 70K a year plus expenses politicians in the Scottish Parliament who continue to allow lawyers to regulate themselves and cover up for their colleagues, either at the point of complaint or in the courts. Its time you, the public are heard. Its time consumers and clients who fund the legal profession come first and make sure YOU, the fee paying client have the final say in what happens to YOUR crooked lawyer.

As the Sunday Mail reveals, clients & consumers are usually not aware their own crooked lawyer is ripping off a host of others, and getting away with it, until the media comes along and reports it to the wider world :

REVEALED: TOP LAWYER AT THE CENTRE OF 12 NEGLIGENCE CLAIMS

EXCLUSIVE Brief who's making a career out of failure

By Russell Findlay April 23 2006 Sunday Mail

THIS is the high-flying solicitor at the centre of a remarkable 12 negligence claims.

John O'Donnell, 54, makes a comfortable living from conducting complicated property transactions.

But we can reveal insurers Royal & Sun Alliance have already been forced to pay out £350,000 on seven negligence claims against him. And at least five more worth £200,000 are still being contested. His firm, John G O'Donnell & Co, is based in Cathcart, Glasgow. The Law Society for Scotland, who govern the conduct of lawyers, keep his record of complaints a secret.

O'Donnell has also been accused of misconduct but the Law Society, â„¢ has not brought any cases to the Scottish Solicitors' Discipline Tribunal. The claims centre on complicated transactions involving property and mortgages. 9 One case settled with an £81,000 payout involved Glasgow boxing promoter Alex Morrison, 67, for whom O'Donnell acted in the 2002 sale of his Sydney Street gym to Scottish Enterprise for £130,000. The sale money should have gone to Morrison's offshore firm, Decafarm Ltd, but was instead issued to O'Donnell's.

Decafarm complained to Strathclyde Police fraud squad but the procurator fiscal decided not to prosecute. 9 In other cases, his clients took out two mortgages on property and sold the property, paying off one mortgage. The others lender then had to pursue the solicitor for negligence to get their money back - and his insurance paid out.

Last night, ex-SNP leader and legal reform campaigner John Swinney said: "This appears a clear example of why a robust and independent complaints handling system is required. I hope forthcoming legislation to be considered by Parliament will address these issues."

Peter Cherbi, of Injustice Scotland, said: "If you buy a tin of beans, you can see the ingredients on the label. If you're paying a solicitor, you should be aware of what he or she has been up to. I'm also asking Justice Minister Cathy Jamieson to revoke the exemption of the Law Society of Scotland from the Freedom of Information Act."

Last month, it emerged that complaints against lawyers had risen 30 per cent in a year to almost 5000. But a Law Society of Scotland spokesman said: "The consumer protections for clients of Scottish solicitors are second to none."

Last night, a legal firm issued a statement on his behalf. It read: During 2000-2002, John O'Donnell received treatment for a mental illness. He was diagnosed with clinical depression. During those dark days, Mr O'Donnell accepts his own high standards slipped. Indeed, when making a determination, the Law Society of Scotland makes reference to his illness, citing this as 'extenuating circumstances'. "In 2003, Mr O'Donnell started a new legal practice and has many loyal and satisfied clients."

Two years ago, the Sunday Mail revealed that O'Donnell's office was searched by police as part of a money-laundering probe into McGovern crime family lieutenant, Russell Stirton, 46.

Remember Remember – Where there’s a will there’s a crook. Suspension from legal practice is, however, no deterrence for crooks to come back and rip off people and their wills, as a recent Sunday Mail article exposed the case of the former jailed lawyer Valerie Macadam, now Valerie Penny returned from legal oblivion & started her own will writing business without telling her new clients she was jailed for embezzlement. Quoting from the Sunday Mail article : “A CROOKED lawyer jailed for stealing money from dead clients is back in business, we can reveal. Valerie Penny, 54, runs a slick website to lure customers into handing over £80 for wills. She is selling the same legal services she used to steal £130,000 from clients and their estates - a catalogue of dishonesty that landed her in prison. The struck-off solicitor, who was called Macadam before her marriage, boasts of her "successful career". But she makes no mention of her jail time for robbing clients' cash or her shocking record of professional misconduct.”

Misplaced trust with complaints : Philip Yelland, the Law Society of Scotland’s Director of Regulation for over 20 years yet Scotland has more crooked lawyers than ever. Philip Yelland, the Law Society of Scotland’s director of standards, previously director of regulation and before that head of the Law Society’s horrifically named “Client Relations Office” has been in charge of regulating crooked lawyers in Scotland for over TWENTY YEARS yet from Penman to the present and beyond, most crooked Scottish lawyers have either received a slap on the wrist or no punishment at all while the client ends up financially ruined and excluded from the courts to make sure justice can never be done. Would you trust anyone like this with your complaint ? Make sure you use the media first before trusting the Law Society or SLCC with your lawyer problems.

They think its all over : Solicitors from Hell owner to appeal High Court’s website shutdown order ‘all the way to Europe if necessary’

It’s not over until the European judges sing : Solicitors from Hell owner will appeal High Court order to close website after the ‘suffering’ of lawyers. IN RESPONSE to the publication of MR JUSTICE TUGENDHAT’s written ruling in the case of The Law Society, Hine Solicitors & Kevin McGrath v Rick Kordowski which granted the vested interests of the legal profession in England & Wales their demand to shut down the critical website known as SOLICITORS FROM HELL where clients could posts online reviews of their experiences with solicitors, Mr Kordowski, the owner of the now censored Solicitors from Hell website has said he intends to appeal the draconian judgement “all the way to Europe if necessary”.

The judgement, dubbed by many as a blistering attack on free speech and the rights of consumers to express their views on services provided to them by their lawyers details in no uncertain terms the lengths to which the vested interests of the legal profession of England & Wales ‘had gone after’ Mr Kordowski.

In one part of the judgement, Mr Justice Tugendhat brands the Solicitors from Hell website owner as “A public nuisance” who “is in effect a vexatious litigant”. Readers of the judgement will note there is not one single remark in the judge’s opinion which appears to be critical of the legal profession.

As Justice Tugendhat’s judgement continues , the Law Society of England & Wales Counsel, Mr Tomlinson states that the Claimants and in particular, the First Claimant, have no objection to proper criticism of the legal profession or debate about whether a particular solicitor has failed to provide service of appropriate quality in a particular case. Informed debate on these issues is clearly in the public interest and a proper exercise of the right to freedom of expression. But he submits that the Website makes no contribution whatever to such debates but instead sets out to and does provide a forum for the publication of malicious and defamatory allegations about solicitors. The Website operates against the public interest and the Claimants have brought this action with the aim of ensuring that it ceases operation. The Law Society is concerned about the enormous reputational damage that is, and can be, done to firms and lawyers as a result of their being listed on the Website. It is also concerned about the disservice to the public. The dissemination of misinformation to members of the public through the Website may deter members of the public from instructing good solicitors.

However, most see the Law Society’s claims against the Solicitors from Hell website as little more than an attempt to censor consumers online debate of how they have been treated by their lawyers, whether good or bad. The legal profession in general are firmly against clients being able to “name & shame” their solicitors in any venue, and have been known to threaten newspapers who carry reports of “crooked lawyers” with legal action or the withdrawal of advertising. In several well known instances in Scotland, individual journalists have had their careers threatened if they did not cease reporting on “crooked lawyers”.

Diary of Injustice earlier this year revealed the Law Society hoped to use its battle with Solicitors from Hell to dissuade the Legal Ombudsman (LeO) from going ahead with its own policy of naming & shaming “crooked lawyers”, reported by Diary of Injustice here : English, Scots Law Societies ‘team up’ in legal moves against “Solicitors from Hell” in bid to stop Legal Ombudsman ‘Naming & Shaming’ crooked lawyers. However the attempt failed, after the LeO announced naming & shaming is to begin in 2012 reported earlier here : Scots to be ‘kept in dark’ on details of crooked lawyers while Legal Ombudsman’s ‘naming & shaming’ policy ‘will protect’ consumers in England & Wales

In what some may see as a spiteful move against Mr Kordowski, who has been made bankrupt by the legal profession in their pursuit of him, the judgement also revealed the trustee in bankruptcy had also gone after the solicitors from hell website domain and all its contents, gaining an interim injunction to prevent Mr Kordowski handing over the website to someone else to operate.

Quoting Mr Justice Tugendhat’s ruling : As a result of the Defendant's bankruptcy the intellectual property rights in the Website and its contents are vested in his trustee in bankruptcy, but he has not taken any steps to transfer them. Rather, on 2 November 2011, he announced that he had decided to "give the website away" to "experienced owners who operate overseas". The Claimants successfully applied for an interim injunction to restrain this transfer on the basis that it would constitute unlawful data processing and harassment. An interim injunction was granted by Langstaff J restraining the transfer ("the Transfer Injunction"), returnable at this hearing.

The full judgement in the case can be read here : The Law Society, Hine Solicitors & Kevin McGrath v Rick Kordowski

Speaking to Diary of Injustice, Mr Kordowski said : “The judgment contains claims that both the second and third Claimants had long suffered significant damage, upset and could not work who the author of the published allegations were. It is interesting to note that neither of these Claimants ever asked me who the author of the posted allegations were. No letters, emails, nothing! As to why they continued to allegedly 'suffer' in the way for many months without contacting the publisher, one can only imagine.”

Mr Kordowski continued : “My argument was (and still is) that the current libel laws are sufficient to protect the defamed. However, Justice Tugendhat states that even if I could prove that every single listing was true and justified or of honest opinion that harassment & data protection laws supersede the current libel laws. Which is quite simply outrageous.”

“He [Justice Tugendhat] states that I am someone who 'STILL attempts to charge lawyers if they want comments to be removed'. He didn't have any evidence to back this up - as there is no evidence. I do not charge lawyers. Justice Tugendhat also goes on to say that I am a 'Public Nuisance' like an environmental hazard!”

“I will appeal, which will be thrown out, obviously. So it seems that both I and the public will not get justice in this country. I will most definitely take this matter to the European Court in Strasbourg. The High Courts decision is simply tyranny - we are not in China, Iran or an African despot, this is the democratic UK!”

Not all lawyers welcomed the terms of the written ruling which shut down Solicitors from Hell, with one solicitor branding the decision as “costly, unbalanced and in the long run, counterproductive to the interests of the legal profession at large”

COWBOYSOLICITORS.COM, a new website to allow consumers to rate their lawyer online. While the battle for Solicitors From Hell looks set to continue all the way to the European Courts, a host of new websites offering consumers the chance to air their views of how they were served by their legal representatives have emerged, the latest one being COWBOYSOLICITORS.COM. The new website, which is free to become a member of, states Solicitors have ruled the roost for far too long, the law society is completely bias against any complaints. The truth is that many UK legal practices are filth ridden and need exposing. Become a free member and start shaming your solicitor within minutes. Manage all listings from your personalized dashboard.

Solicitors from Hell 2 has returned to replace the original Solicitors from Hell website. The new Solicitors from Hell 2 website which is registered in the USA, and is thus outwith the reach of UK Libel laws, replaces the now censored Solicitors from Hell. As before, clients can rate their solicitors and document their experiences whether good or bad although this time, it may be more difficult for the Law Society to act. The new website states : Solicitors From Hell 2 will allow people to upload articles about Solicitors from within the UK or anywhere else in the world this will be done automatically & free of charge. Should a complaint arise we will require evidence to substantiate your complaint. or the removal of the offending post or words will take place. This will be at the sole discretion of Solicitors From Hell 2 editors. Further should anyone claim that any item is defamatory and can prove the information wrong then the post will be removed free of charge.

So those of you looking for an opportunity to name & shame your poorly performing or even crooked lawyer, there is now even more choice to do so, courtesy of the Law Society’s attack on UK consumers right of free speech.

Solicitors From Hell removed from internet as UK High Court grants injunction to Law Society of England & Wales to censor client reviews of lawyers

UK High Court grants injunction to Law Society to remove Solicitors from Hell website from internet. SOLICITORS FROM HELL, the well known website which allowed clients to post online reviews in their own words of experiences with their legal representatives has been REMOVED from the internet after the Hon. Mr Justice Michael Tugendhat, sitting in the High Court in London granted an injunction to law firm Brett Wilson LLP on behalf of the Law Society of England & Wales, a so far unidentified law firm and a solicitor. The injunction, secured by Hugh Tomlinson QC and Sara Mansoori of Matrix Chambers as announced on Brett Wilson LLP’s blog, followed a successful application for judgment in default against Mr Rick Kordowski, the owner of the SfH website.

Speaking to Diary of Injustice earlier today, Rick Kordowski said : “The Law Society issued an application for 'default' judgment. Justice Tugendhat, after perusing many avenues with Hugh Tomlinson QC as to the most appropriate course of action to stop me publishing, including at one stage the Public Disorder Act, decided to issue the default judgment along with two injunction with immediate effect.”

Mr Kordowski continued : “"Of all the 'Acknowledgement of Service' forms I have sent to the court in the past, I find it 'strange' that the one relating to The Law Society's class action, had not been lodged”.

The Law Society of England & Wales have now issued a press release on the decision, however a source already commented : “.. some of its members were happy the website had disappeared from existence”

Lawyers & their grudges ? Law Society Chief Executive Desmond Hudson Des Hudson the £400K-A-YEAR Chief Executive of the Law Society of England & Wales who pursued the SfH website through the courts at huge cost to members, commented in a Press Release : “This website has served simply as a vehicle for pursuing personal grudges and vendettas against conscientious and reputable firms and legal professionals. Far from being of any help to consumers, it has been a danger. Some excellent firms have been listed on the website, and exclusion from the site has more often than not been a matter of whether a firm has been prepared to pay a fee to have the listing removed. I feared the website was directing people in real need of help away from professionals best placed to assist them.”

While noting Mr Hudson’s comments, consumers have themselves, witnessed first hand the power of lawyers pursuing personal grudges & vendettas against clients who raise complaints with the Law Society of England & Wales & Legal Ombudsman (LeO), or in Scotland via the Law Society of Scotland & Scottish Legal Complaints Commission (SLCC).

Cases brought to the attention of Diary of Injustice over the years where lawyers have pursued personal vendettas & grudges against clients reveal instances of people being denied legal representation, being denied access to courts, being hounded by Police and other public agencies, coincidentally all occurring after a client had lodged a complaint against their solicitor. The grudges & vendettas all apparently helped along by equally prejudiced & vindictive officials at the Law Society of Scotland.

In on example, one elderly client who raised a complaint against their solicitor with the Law Society of Scotland, was threatened with having his pension taken away from him and being made homeless after his solicitor provided a false statement to Police & Benefits officials and the pensioner’s Housing Association, where a relative of the solicitor worked. No action was taken against the pensioner when all three agencies investigated the allegations and found them to be false. However, for some reason, the authorities took no action against the solicitor who provided the false information in order to intimidate his former client, and this same solicitor is known to have been the subject of many complaints to the Law Society including frauds against deceased client’s estates.

On a personal note, if Mr Hudson is looking for examples of lawyers pursuing personal grudges & vendettas against clients, there are many, usually involving the fabrication of evidence against former clients, or a more extreme example, where in one case a still-working solicitor asked one of his criminal clients to pour petrol through the letterbox of a client who raised a complaint about a £300K will fraud.

The Solicitors from Hell website has operated for a number of years, enabling clients of solicitors to write their own reviews of their lawyers work in their own words, something the Law Society of England & Wales have found difficult to accept, culminating in the Law Society’s use of the courts to silence the right of consumers to write about their own experiences and thus alert others as to the potential dangers of dealing with a solicitor or law firm which had already failed their clients.

A long campaign by the Law Society of England & Wales against the Solicitors from Hell website ensued, which at times drew highly personalised & bitter attacks on its owner, Mr Kordowski. In one now widely reported instance Des Hudson the £400K-A-YEAR Chief Executive of the Law Society of England & Wales was alleged to have branded Mr Kordowski “a criminal” after a BBC Radio debate with Law Professor John Flood, Additional coverage on the Law Society v Solicitors from Hell battle over naming & shaming 'crooked lawyers' has been reported by Diary of Injustice in earlier articles,, HERE.

A legal observer commenting on the decision branded lawyers use of the courts against consumers of legal services as“vile” & “degrading to free speech”. He said : “There is clearly a problem with the legal system when lawyers and their lobby groups can use the courts to prevent clients talking freely about the level of service they receive from their legal representatives.”

He continued : “The removal of Solicitors from Hell from the internet simply because a profession feared it was losing business because its clientele were able to write the gory details of how badly their solicitors handled their legal affairs is an attack on free speech and will rightly leave people even more suspicious about dealing with solicitors.”

An official from a well known consumer group, speaking to Diary of Injustice on the matter commented : “Whatever the rights & wrongs of the website, censorship is never to be welcomed in a democracy. With cases such as this, the perception of our legal system is that the courts are giving more rights to convicted criminals & terrorists than consumers who want to write about their own experiences in the legal world or alert others about the poor treatment they have suffered at the hands of the legal profession.”

While the Law Society of England & Wales, its members, and apparently the Law Society of Scotland are happy today over the demise of the Solicitors from Hell website, the legal action to delete SFH from public view, legal action which both Law Societies were planning to use in a similar way to deter the Legal Ombudsman (LeO) from naming & shaming ‘crooked lawyers’, reported by Diary of Injustice here : English, Scots Law Societies ‘team up’ in legal moves against “Solicitors from Hell” in bid to stop Legal Ombudsman ‘Naming & Shaming’ crooked lawyers.

Legal Ombudsman was to be subject of desperate personal attacks from lawyers in attempt to thwart official naming & shaming by LeO. Some within the legal profession of England & Wales have branded the Legal Ombudsman’s decision to name & shame lawyers & law firms who fail their clients as a “witch hunt” however, details of just how solicitors hoped to ‘persuade’ the Legal Ombudsman not to go ahead with a naming & shaming policy are nothing short of a witch hunt on their own, where material disclosed to Diary of Injustice indicated key officials from both the Scottish & English legal professions discussed angles of attack against the LeO which clearly inferred members of the Legal Ombudsman’s staff were to be subject to the same types of personal & public criticism by the legal profession against others who reported on ‘solicitors wrongdoings’ if the LeO went ahead with naming & shaming.

Attempts by the legal profession throughout the UK to persuade the Legal Ombudsman against naming & shaming ultimately did not succeed, with the Legal Ombudsman announcing last week it will be naming & shaming solicitors in certain circumstances, beginning next year in 2012, reported in more detail here : Scots to be ‘kept in dark’ on details of crooked lawyers while Legal Ombudsman’s ‘naming & shaming’ policy ‘will protect’ consumers in England & Wales.

A final message from Rick Kordowski on the Solicitors from Hell website, before it was ordered removed by the High Court stated : Your right to ‘Freedom of Speech’ - Preserved!

I would like to thank the dozens of authors who have taken the trouble to write and send in a Witness Statement confirming that what is posted on this website is true. I would also like to thank the lawyers and barristers who have contacted me offering their pro-bono help and expressing their concerns about the Law Society’s High Court action to have this website shut down.

However, past experience has taught me that regardless of how much evidence I present in the High Court to support my defence or claim, the judicial system will always side with the law firm, solicitor, or in this case The Law Society.

In order to secure the future of this website and your right to freedom of speech, I have decided to give the website away. The new experienced owners, who operate overseas, will be taking this site to the next level in terms of world wide promotion and ease of access by the public.

All current reviews will need to be re-entered and they will be posted automatically on a new style website (similar to TripAdvisor). Authors will be able to edit and update their listings at any time. Others can make further reviews and solicitors can post a response. Full rating system and the ability to upload evidence, to name just a few advantages. All totally free of charge and out of the reach of The Law Society of England and Wales.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone again for their previous support and kind words. Godspeed.

This article has been updated to include the Press Release from the Law Society of England Wales and additional material. It is very clear to this journalist from this situation, and all clients who have fell by the wayside before it, that a lawyer harbouring a grudge and pursuing a personal vendetta against clients who are forced to complain about the quality of their legal services, is most certainly a greater threat to society at large than any consumer advocate.

Scots to be ‘kept in dark’ on details of crooked lawyers while Legal Ombudsman’s ‘naming & shaming’ policy ‘will protect’ consumers in England & Wales

Legal Ombudsman for England & Wales to name & shame crooked lawyers while Scots consumers left in the dark over Scots legal profession’s villains. NAMING & SHAMING CROOKED LAWYERS is to go ahead in England & Wales in 2012 after a decision stating It is right to publish the names of lawyers in specific circumstances was announced earlier this week by the Office for Legal Complaints which oversees the Legal Ombudsman (LeO). The widely welcomed move for consumers of legal services in England & Wales comes after several consultations held by the Legal Ombudsman over plans to identify law firms & lawyers who let down their clients, moves which were supported by consumer organisations such as Which?, the Legal Services Consumer Panel, the Office of Fair Trading (OFT), academics & UK Government Ministers.

Scotland’s legal regulator the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission has no plans to name & shame crooked lawyers. However, here in Scotland, there are currently NO PLANS by the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission (SLCC) to identify the serial crooked lawyers & law firms who do business in the Scottish legal system. The SLCC has previously claimed all complaints must be treated confidentially, however critics & consumer advocates feel the SLCC’s confidentiality policy exists simply to protect lawyers, ensuring that consumers are not able to find out just how crooked some lawyers & law firms in Scotland really are.

While Scots consumers are to be left in the dark over how crooked their lawyers really are, the Legal Ombudsman’s office has moved ahead on the matter, issuing a Press Release Naming Lawyers – Protecting Consumers (pdf), in which it stated : “It is right to publish the names of lawyers in specific circumstances. That’s the decision of the Office for Legal Complaints which oversees the Legal Ombudsman.The Ombudsman has dealt with some seventy-thousand calls about the legal profession in the last year. From 2012, information about complaints resolved by an Ombudsman decision will be available to the public.”

Firms and individual lawyers will be named where there is a pattern of complaints or when it is in the public interest to do so.  The move is in response to issues raised by lawyers, consumers, Ministers and others who took part in the year-long consultation on the subject.

Elizabeth France, Chair of the Office for Legal Complaints. Commenting on the decision to allow the Legal Ombudsman to name & shame failing lawyers & law firms, Elizabeth France Chair of the Office for Legal Complaints said : “We consider we have struck a balance between protecting consumers and encouraging an independent and strong legal profession. Every day we know most lawyers do a good job for their clients – but there are some who simply don’t. That’s why it’s in the profession’s interest to make sure all who provide services to consumers are doing so effectively.”

Every three months the Legal Ombudsman will also publish lawyers’ names and firms involved in all complaints that have been resolved by a formal Ombudsman decision. This means that examples of good practice as well as bad will be there for all to see.

Consumer Minister Ed Davey MP. Commenting on the move, Ed Davey MP, the Consumer Minister said : “I am pleased that the Legal Ombudsman has decided to publish this data. This will make the legal profession stronger, improve service standards and consumers will be better protected as a result. As the Government set out in our consumer empowerment strategy, Better Choices, Better Deals, we are keen to see more information such as this being made available by ombudsmen and regulators.This will enable consumers to be armed with the best possible information before purchasing goods or services.”

Legal Services Consumer Panel Chief hails naming & shaming as ‘great success’. The decision has also been welcomed by consumer groups including the Legal Services Consumer Panel. The Panel’s Chair, Elisabeth Davies said : “This is great news for consumers who tell us they feel in the dark when trying to find a good lawyer. Today’s announcement means there will no longer be a hiding place for the minority in the profession who provide a poor service and fail to put things right. People use legal services at critical moments in their lives and it is entirely appropriate that those who provide these services are held accountable if they get things wrong.”

Which? also supported the decision to identify poorly performing solicitors. Asked for comment on the decision to name & shame rogue solicitors, Which? executive director, Richard Lloyd, said : "The Legal Ombudsman has made the right decision to publish the names of lawyers who give poor service. People will finally be able to make an informed choice about which lawyer they use, and can avoid those lawyers that fail consumers."

The Law Society of Scotland are firmly against naming & shaming crooked lawyers in Scotland. In stark comparison to the moves in England & Wales to allow consumers to find out more about their lawyers and especially the ones who continually let down their clients, Diary of Injustice can confirm that Scots consumers are for now, to be left out of sharing the benefits of increased information about members of the Scottish legal profession who fall foul of complaints. With the Law Society of Scotland FIRMLY AGAINST any move to publicly identify the corrupt element of its members, the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission and Scottish Government have so far REFUSED to back moves which would see Scots given the same information to be made available in England & Wales which would enable clients to better decide which law firm or lawyer in Scotland is honest enough to handle their legal interests.

Jane Irvine, Chair of the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission who are reluctant to name & shame crooked lawyers. The Scottish Legal Complaints Commission has previously argued it cannot name & shame any crooked lawyers in Scotland because of the terms of the Legal Profession & Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 2007, which direct that all complaints matters and information arising from complaints are to be confidential. The 2007 Act also criminalises any leaks of information from the SLCC with harsh penalties for those within the organisation who whistle-blow on the SLCC’s numerous & now famous anti-client policies. The SLCC were asked for comment however none was provided at time of publication.

Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill has been asked to allow naming & shaming of Scotland’s crooked lawyers. Today, the Scottish Government & Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill have been invited to allow naming & shaming of rogue law firms & lawyers in Scotland with a request to amend any parts of the Legal Profession & Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 2007 and any other relevant legislation which the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission and Scotland’s legal profession at large have been using as an excuse to avoid the issue of naming & shaming the many serial crooked lawyers who crop up on a continual basis in complaint after complaint.

It is most certainly in the public interest Scots consumers of legal services have at the very lest the same rights & entitlements of their counterparts in England & Wales where such information as is to be published by the Legal Ombudsman in the rest of the UK should also be published relevant to all those solicitors & legal professionals operating in the Scottish legal services market.

Diary of Injustice has previously reported on naming & shaming crooked lawyers here :  Naming & shaming crooked lawyers - The story so far

Decision day looms for Legal Ombudsman on ‘naming & shaming’ rogue solicitors as Scottish & UK consumers demand freedom to ‘rate your own lawyer’

Legal Ombudsman for England & Wales is expected to decide on naming & shaming before end of the year. AS DEMANDS GROW from consumers of legal services in Scotland & throughout the UK for an independent and transparent ratings system for lawyers & law firms, insiders from the consumer world report the Legal Ombudsman (LeO) which regulates complaints against the legal profession in England & Wales is expected to decide by the end of the year at the latest on how it will finally proceed to identify ‘crooked lawyers’ who have been found guilty of failing their clients after being subjected to investigations by the independent law complaints regulator.

Kenny MacAskill’s Scottish Legal Complaints Commission are determined not to identify crooked lawyers, even ones who steal legal aid funds. Yet while consumers in England & Wales will have the added protection of knowing exactly which solicitors & law firms fail their clients, and in what particular types of cases, giving clients the chance to dodge a potentially explosive, expensive bullet of a serial crooked lawyer, there is to be no similar move in Scotland by the Law Society ‘controlled’ Scottish Legal Complaints Commission (SLCC) who have kept firmly out of the debate of identifying Scotland’s worst lawyers who continue to rip off multiple clients who are given a chance to walk away from a ruined client with as little as a £10 fine, regardless of the true financial loss to their client.

I reported on the Legal Ombudsman’s plans to name & shame poorly performing law firms & solicitors earlier in March, here : Name & Shame : Complaints data on law firms to be published in England & Wales, Scots solicitors complaints history to remain secret, for now however, the road to publicly naming the worst elements of the legal profession in England & Wales has been a rocky one, with consultation after consultation, more on which was reported here : England & Wales : Legal Ombudsman criticised as ‘name & shame’ policy hit by lawyers protests over insurance costs, second consultation now underway and alleged secret threats of legal action by the Law Society of England & Wales if the LeO’s plans went ahead.

Legal Ombudsman for England & Wales, Adam Sampson has backing to name rogue lawyers & law firms.As the LeO’s plan to identify solicitors & law firms in complaints judgements has the backing of consumer organisations such as Which?, and the Office of Fair Trading (OFT), the UK Government and the Legal Services Consumer Panel, more of which cab be read in an earlier report here : Legal Ombudsman moving to name & shame crooked lawyers in England & Wales, crooked Scottish solicitors records to remain protected by secrecy for now, observers in the consumer world say the time has now come for the LeO to act on the matter at hand, as consumers are being put at an ever increasing risk of using the wrong lawyer they know nothing about, particularly in these tough financial times where clients cannot afford to get into long running & costly spats with their legal representatives over misrepresentation, negligence, or even fraud.

One client who spoke to Diary of Injustice said it was imperative the LeO identified lawyers who fail their clients so that others can avoid the same fate.

He said : “The Legal Ombudsman has to get on with this now rather than waiting until its too late. I have spoken to people I know who used the same lawyer as I did and ended up with a huge bill and the same failure to do anything in their case. They said if they had known of what happened to me they would have avoided using the same lawyer.”

He continued : “Everyone should know the names of useless lawyers who mess up their clients cases and there should be some sort of online directory where we as clients can write about what really happened so nothing is missed out. I really wouldn't want what happened to me at the hands of a crook in a suit, happening to others.”

There is no announcement yet from the Legal Ombudsman on how the naming & shaming policy will be implemented, however Diary of Injustice will report on developments as they occur.

RATE YOUR LAWYER – GOOD, RUBBISH, OR CROOKED :

In the meantime, Diary of Injustice has received considerable contact from clients across Scotland and in England & Wales on the subject of implementing a ratings system allowing clients themselves to rate their own lawyer. Many ideas have been expressed on who should be in charge of overseeing such a ‘directory’ with many readers pointing out the legal profession cannot be trusted to maintain any kind of book or register on their own abilities as seen from the client perspective. I agree.

Solicitors from Hell website allows clients to comment on their experiences with lawyers. While the Legal Ombudsman takes the time to decide on how to proceed with naming & shaming ‘crooked lawyers’, the website “SOLICITORS FROM HELL” currently offers clients an opportunity to write about their own experiences with their lawyers, whether good or bad. I suggest consumers use the SFH facility. However, as readers will also be aware, the Law Society of England & Wales, apparently supported by their Scottish counterparts the Law Society of Scotland, are trying to close down Solicitors From Hell on the basis the SFH website gives too much free speech to consumers to name & shame their lawyers over failures we should all have the right to know about.

Diary of Injustice earlier reported the legal profession’s battle against Rick Kordowski & Solicitors From Hell, here : English, Scots Law Societies ‘team up’ in legal moves against “Solicitors from Hell” in bid to stop Legal Ombudsman ‘Naming & Shaming’ crooked lawyers after an investigation in Scotland turned up discussions at the Law Society of Scotland who were keen to support moves to kill off Solicitors From Hell in a joint attempt with the Law Society of England & Wales to ‘scare off’ the Legal Ombudsman’s intentions to identify poorly performing solicitors & law firms in published complaints decisions & investigations. The Law Society of England & Wales battle to undermine the owner of the Solicitors From Hell later took a highly personalised twist as Diary of Injustice reported during mid September : Naming crooks is criminal ? Law Society of England & Wales Chief Des Hudson to face legal action from Solicitors From Hell owner over "criminal" jibe.

Further developments in the Law Society v Solicitors From Hell battle will be reported later this week.

HUSH MONEY MAKES THE CASE FOR NAMING & SHAMING STRONGER THAN EVER :

Since reporting on the naming & shaming issue, Diary of Injustice has been approached by a Scottish solicitor acting on behalf of others who is apparently keen to steer this reporter away from further reporting on the Legal Ombudsman’s moves to identify law firms & solicitors who fail their clients. Additionally, a financial incentive was offered in an apparent attempt to persuade Diary of Injustice to drop reporting on the Solicitors from Hell case. Readers can rest assured, neither of the two incidents will have any effect on this journalist’s reporting on the legal profession or campaigning for reforms of consumer protection against the closed shop world of lawyer regulating lawyer and lawyers covering up for their colleagues, all the way up to the highest positions in the judiciary.

You, the Scots consumer of legal services have a right to know the full regulatory history of those in the legal profession you choose as your legal representatives. Given consumers in England & Wales will eventually be able to find out much of this same information, you should begin writing to your MSPs and the Scottish Government now to ensure YOUR RIGHTS are placed above vested interests.

After all, YOU are paying for your legal services, YOU have the right to know exactly who they are, what they are capable of, and whether they have damaged any clients in the past.

Naming crooks is criminal ? Law Society of England & Wales Chief Des Hudson to face legal action from Solicitors From Hell owner over "criminal" jibe

Law Society of England & Wales Chief Des Hudson is accused of branding owner of critical website “a criminal” for naming crooked lawyers. THE LIMITS of what the UK’s ‘control freak’ legal profession will stand or even allow in terms of public criticism have taken a new twist after information emerged on a Law Professor’s blog detailing a conversation in which Des Hudson the £400K-A-YEAR Chief Executive of the Law Society of England & Wales is alleged to have branded Mr Rick Kordowski “A CRIMINAL” for his SOLICITORS FROM HELL website’s consumer reviews of poor solicitors & criticisms of solicitors. In response, Mr Korwowski, the owner of the increasingly well known UK based website which names & shames crooked lawyers from all across the UK, has announced he is to sue Des Hudson for defamation, seeking “substantial damages”.

The incident came to light after the Law Society Chief Executive took part in a joint interview with well known Law Professor John Flood of the University of Westminster on BBC Radio FOUR’s consumer programme “You and Yours” which discussed the Solicitors From Hell website and its policy of naming & shaming lawyers who fail their clients by allowing consumers to write their own reviews of how they were treated by their solicitors. The interview with Des Hudson & John Flood can be heard in full HERE.

After the interview had taken place, Professor Flood wrote on his web blog in an article dated 22 July 2011 : “As I came out of the BBC yesterday with Des Hudson, the chief executive of the Law Society, he said Rick Kordowski was a criminal. I reminded Des that the police didn't think so. He wasn't happy.”

The battle by Mr Kordowski to keep the Solicitors From Hell website inline in the face of a coordinated campaign by the legal profession in England & Wales who appear to be out to personally ruin him for his website’s publication of criticisms the legal profession and allowing consumers to write their own views of their poor experiences in the legal world, can be read in more detail on the Solicitors From Hell website HERE and in yesterday’s Independent on Sunday newspaper HERE

Rick Kordowski, writing on his website revealed the Law Society have also demanded he surrender the domain name “Solicitors From Hell”. He wrote : “During negotiations, I offered to re-engineer my website to The Law Society’s specifications and parameters at my expense. The Law Society rejected this offer and further added: "A pre-requisite will be that the site in its current form – with all its content/postings – is taken down forthwith. You will also need to surrender the domain name [......] If not then there is no point pursuing discussions further and the matter is best left for the High Court. And then sent me a letter of claim insisting that I shut down this site and promise not to do it again. "

Mr Kordowski added : “Tyranny at work, springs to mind! Why should The Law Society stifle public criticism of allegedly shoddy lawyers? Are the public too stupid even to have the right to criticise, as The Law Society seem to be suggesting?”

Professor John Flood, Professor of Law an Sociology at the University of Westminster. Speaking to Diary of Injustice today, Professor Flood commented on the Law Society of England & Wales battle against Solicitors From Hell. He said : “What I can say is that the Law Society should be thinking about the clients who feel so aggrieved that they are compelled to write to SfH. That to pursue Rick Kordowski is to shoot the messenger rather than deal with the substantive issues in the complaints.”

He continued : “Lawyers must realise there is a new culture present, one that is less adversarial, one that is focussed on resolution, as the Legal Ombudsman is trying to show. I'm not sure the Law Society has fully grasped this.”

Last week, I reported the legal profession’s battle against Rick Kordowski & Solicitors From Hell, here : English, Scots Law Societies ‘team up’ in legal moves against “Solicitors from Hell” in bid to stop Legal Ombudsman ‘Naming & Shaming’ crooked lawyers after an investigation in Scotland turned up discussions at the Law Society of Scotland who were keen to support moves to kill off Solicitors From Hell in a joint attempt with the Law Society of England & Wales to ‘scare off’ the Legal Ombudsman’s intentions to identify poorly performing solicitors & law firms in published complaints decisions & investigations.

Crucially, consumer group Which? & the Legal Services Consumer Panel (LSCP) both said the court action against Solicitors From Hell would probably not be going ahead if the Legal Ombudsman had already begun naming & shaming law firms who fail their clients. The Legal Ombudsman has held a consultation on naming & shaming solicitors & law firms but has yet to make a decision on going ahead with the policy, which is supported by consumer groups, the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) & the UK Government which I reported on in an earlier, article, HERE.

Consumer group Which? gave their comments on the LeO’s plans to identify crooked lawyers in England & Wales. A spokesperson for Which? said : “Which? strongly supports the principle of the LeO publishing complaints data under a strict and published policy , including in some circumstances the name of the law firm concerned. We set out our position in our response to the LeO consultation (page 51: opening up regulatory data)) pointing out that it is the expectation of Government that complaints handling bodies are as transparent as possible.”

Asked for their comment on allegations the legal action against Solicitors from Hell was part of a plan by the Law Society of England & Wales to prevent the Legal Ombudsman from naming & shaming ‘crooked lawyers’, the Which? spokesperson said : “The action being taken against Solicitors from Hell by the Law Society is partly due, in our view, to the fact that LeO does not yet publish complaints data. We consider it far more sensible that complaints data is published under a clear policy framework by an ombudsman scheme. Given this, we would find it regretful if any legal action were to be brought against the LeO by the legal profession in England & Wales if "naming & shaming" is to be adopted by the LeO as a future policy.”

Speaking on the LeO’s plans to publish complaints data & the identities of law firms who perform poorly for clients, Elisabeth Davies, Chair of the Legal Services Consumer Panel (LSCP), said : “Research shows that UK consumers are now leaving well over 100 million comments online every year about their experience with businesses across the economy. Lawyers cannot escape this welcome emergence of consumer power, but instead should seek and then use such feedback to improve the service they offer.

She continued : “The courts will decide the fate of the Solicitors From Hell website. However, such websites fill a vacuum that exists because official complaints data about lawyers is not publically available to help consumers identify good quality lawyers. The Panel will continue to push the Legal Ombudsman to name those law firms who regularly provide poor service.”

CRIMINALISING CRITICS : Law Society of Scotland official told journalist : “Anyone who criticises the legal profession must be a criminal and should be treated like a criminal”.

The sentiments apparently expressed by Mr Hudson who attempts to criminalise Mr Kordowski and critics of the legal profession are startlingly similar to opinions expressed in Scotland by the most senior officials at the Law Society of Scotland, individual solicitors, law firms and the Legal Defence Union, who have all attempted to close down critical websites naming & shaming crooked lawyers who are still working and whose clients are unaware of their poor records as solicitors.

In one of several examples of over-the-top attacks on critics of the legal profession, notes taken by a journalist working for a Scottish newspaper revealed a senior Law Society of Scotland figure made a variety of bitter, hate-fuelled remarks against critics, in one, expressing : “Anyone who criticises the legal profession must be a criminal and should be treated like a criminal”.

Leslie Cumming, former Law Society Chief Accountant – His assault was used by Law Society of Scotland officials in attempts to censor, imprison critics of legal profession in Scotland. In another example, involving the attack on former Law Society Chief Accountant Leslie Cumming, senior Law Society figures including Douglas Mill blamed websites including “Diary of Injustice” (which was only two weeks old at the time) for the attack on Mr Cumming, with Scotland on Sunday reporting in an article dated 29 January 2006 : “Senior figures in the Law Society have made it known they feel some of the websites criticising lawyers are tantamount to incitement to violence.”

An insider who had knowledge of the Scotland on Sunday story and how it was developing confessed the direct comments from Law Society officials “were too strong to put into the final version which appeared in the newspaper”. A journalist who was privately briefed by senior Law Society officials including former Chief Executive Douglas Mill who was forced to resign after a well known episode at the Scottish Parliament, described some comments from Law Society officials which are confirmed in notes, as “highly defamatory”. He went onto say “I felt I was being set up to write a piece implicating critics of lawyers in the attack.”

Further reports in the media linked the attack on Leslie Cumming to crooked lawyers within the Law Society itself who feared Mr Cumming’s department ‘were onto them’, however the hunt for the attacker was scaled down after several years had passed without an arrest.

Later, journalists working on the case discovered spurious statements were provided to Lothian & Borders Police by Law Society officials who were eager to blame outspoken critics of the legal profession in Scotland. The rumour was the Law Society of Scotland wanted the Police to silence those who exposed ‘crooked lawyers’. Evidence of these comments & statements have recently been provided to those who were targeted by the Law Society in this way, and journalists looking further into the case have reported a relative of Mr Cumming was a serving officer in Lothian & Borders Police.

Several Scottish newspapers reported earlier this year an individual has since been arrested for the attack on Mr Cumming however no further reporting on the case can be made at this time due to contempt of court laws. The accused is due to face a trial in October 2011.

Given I know what kind of pressure, tricks, threats, and indeed connections the legal profession will be using against “Solicitors From Hell”, may I extend my best wishes and support to Rick Kordowski for his exemplary effort in bringing the issue & discussion of criticism of the legal profession into the mainstream media and for the continued existence of “Solicitors From Hell” and the consumers right to exactly document for themselves their experiences, whether good or bad, at the hands of the legal profession throughout the entire UK.

At least in England & Wales, the debate is live, while here in Scotland, there are no moves to name & shame crooked lawyers where all discussion of it appears to be censored by the Law Society of Scotland and the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission.