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.

Former lawyer jailed for stealing clients £130K returns to run will-writing business as Law Society protects its own will rip-off solicitors

Law Society refused to confirm whether victims of Valerie MacAdam had been repaid. A SOLICITOR who was jailed for three years in 2008 at Edinburgh Sheriff Court after being found guilty of embezzling £130,000 of client funds has returned to Scotland’s legal services marketplace with a will writing business, according to an investigation carried out by the Sunday Mail newspaper.

Valerie Macadam, now Valerie Penny has been identified as running the “wills at home” website, which states : “A new service is available! After a successful career as a lawyer, Valerie Penny lectured in law for several years. She then moved to the traditional Craft Town of West Kilbride six months ago having married local man, David Penny. She has now established a new business that will be of use to the whole community.”

The website goes onto state : “The firm also offers preparation of documents in the comfort of clients own homes or another convenient place of their choosing. This is much more relaxed and personal, but no less professional than the service conventionally provided in an office environment. Clients are ensured not only confidentiality, but also safe keeping of deeds as documents are retained in a secure document safe.”

There is no mention on the wills at home website of Ms Penny's colourful history as a lawyer, nor are clients alerted to her conviction & three year jail sentence, which the Journalonline reported “was reduced from four years for an early guilty plea. Macadam took money from the bank accounts of clients and life savings of others as she handled their wills, stealing from five clients in total over a period of six years. Macadam had been banned from practising as a solicitor in 2004 following a Law Society of Scotland investigation.

Philip Yelland, the Law Society of Scotland’s Director of Regulation for over 20 years. Philip Yelland, the Law Society of Scotland’s director of standards, said: “The Law Society of Scotland acted to protect the firm’s clients and Ms Macadam has not been able to practise as a solicitor in Scotland since 2004. Solicitors are trusted to handle millions of pounds of client funds each year. Honesty and integrity are absolutely paramount within the solicitors' profession. Those who are suspected of stealing from clients will be investigated and, if they are found to be acting dishonestly or fraudulently, strong action will be taken against them, both by the Society and the courts.”

What a lot of rubbish Mr Yelland. You may as well have sent all her clients off to Andrew Penman at Stormonth Darling in Kelso to be fleeced again.

I covered Valerie Macadam’s conviction and side issues relating to solicitors ripping off clients for double fees in an article during late 2008, here : Lawyers stealing from clients to earn 'double fees' while Law Society looks the other way in vast network of legal aid fraud & embezzlement

The report from the Sunday Mail follows, although I feel I should emphasise some points to my own readers. The lawyer quoted in the Sunday Mail’s story, Bruce de Wert, who is an “Honorary Sheriff” and runs a will writing business (Scottwills) along with a divorce business (MyScottishDivorce) states : "When you deal with a solicitor, you will normally find they also offer a will storage service - usually for free. But the difference is solicitors are heavily regulated and, in the event they were to retire or go out of business, the Law Society ensures these wills are properly passed on to another solicitor."

Many solicitors actually charge for holding wills & documents. I know this to be the case as I’ve had fee notes for this service. I have also had numerous readers come to me with examples of similar fee notes, with some solicitors occasionally refusing to hand over documents they are holding for clients until very dubious & usually very high charges and fee demands are paid.

The part about solicitors being heavily regulated is of course irrelevant because as we all know, solicitors are ineffectually regulated by the Law Society of Scotland & Scottish Legal Complaints Commission, and that is why I have seen & reported on hundreds of cases of will fraud by solicitors over many years. If solicitors were so well regulated, I wouldn't be able to write about such cases, and of course, if solicitors were so well regulated, there wouldn't be so many Andrew Penmans out there doing much the same as those featuring in headline after headline after headline.

Personally of course, I don't believe anyone should make tens of thousands of pounds out of a family member passing on their final wishes to their family or whoever they choose to leave their wealth.

After being dragged through the Law Society’s sinister complaints practices, and having a solicitor and an accountant basically put a gun to my family’s head, hound us for years, harass us, follow us, threaten us, make our lives a misery while they both got away with it, I am of course bound to say this, but I say it because I don't want anyone else to go through it, so be careful who you trust your will to, and indeed for that, all your legal interests and remember, there are just as many criminals still inside the Scottish legal profession who will ruin your will & your legal interests, as those outside who might not be telling their clients all they need to hear.

For those readers concerned about their wills and other documents being held by their solicitors, I have written articles which readers might be interested in HERE

The regulation of will writers has entered into law as part of the Scottish Government’s Legal Services (Scotland) Act 2010 (pdf) Chapter Two specifically referring to regulation, and it may come as no surprise to all, the Law Society of Scotland is in the frame to regulate non-lawyer will writers, as I featured earlier, here : Scottish Government plan to regulate non-lawyer 'will writers' may see Law Society regulate all complaints against mishandled wills, legal business

I recently covered the subject of will writers, lawyer & non-lawyer, and their lack of effective regulation, here : R.I.P. OFF : Lack of independent regulation reveals solicitors, accountants & will writers should not be trusted on wills, final wishes & bequests

Now over to the Sunday Mail :

Shamed lawyer who robbed clients out of jail and back in business

Nov 28 2010 Exclusive by Russell Findlay and Lauren Crooks, Sunday Mail

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.

Last week Sunday Mail investigators caught her back in action touting wills and other legal services.

US-born Penny, who has practised law in Scotland and New York, was jailed for three years in December 2008 for stealing £130,000 from clients, some of whom were dead. She seized control of their finances through "power of attorney", then syphoned their life savings over a six-year period. She specialised in conveyancing and wills at her law firm in Edinburgh's posh Charlotte Square before her crime spree was uncovered.

After being freed from Cornton Vale prison in June, Penny launched Wills at Home from her house in West Kilbride, Ayrshire. She and second husband David, 50, a nuclear power station security guard, sell wills and power of attorney documents through online ads.

Her website states: "After a successful career as a lawyer, Valerie Penny lectured in law for several years. "North Ayrshire is the first area in Scotland to have the benefit of Wills at Home but Valerie plans to extend the service throughout the country quickly."

Last week Penny and her husband met our reporters - posing as a couple - at a Kilmarnock hotel and offered two wills for £120. After making and printing the first will, she said: "Now do you have somewhere fireproof to keep the wills? No, well, we have a safe. We can keep them there if you're happy for us to do that. It's what normally happens."

She handed a copy of one will to our team but forgot to print the second. She promised: "I'll send it to you. Are you wanting to pay cash? If we're holding the deeds, there's a small extra charge of £15 per deed. But if you're paying cash, we can make it £140 instead of £150."

The Scottish Government are set to pass a new law to tackle the unregulated will industry.

Lawyer Bruce de Wert, a wills expert based in Wick, was stunned at our revelations about Penny. He said: "I am distressed to hear a convicted embezzler is offering a will-making and storage service.

"I can't imagine anyone who knew her background would accept her service. Apart from the obvious concerns of dealing with a criminal, I do worry that the wills she has produced may never be found.

"When you deal with a solicitor, you will normally find they also offer a will storage service - usually for free. But the difference is solicitors are heavily regulated and, in the event they were to retire or go out of business, the Law Society ensures these wills are properly passed on to another solicitor."

Penny first appeared in front of the Scottish Solicitors' Discipline Tribunal in 2003, which found her guilty of a catalogue of misconduct but failed to strike her off. Two years later she was finally kicked out of the profession for another long litany of misconduct.

The SSDT found Penny "deliberately and fraudulently" forged a signature on a document relating to a dead client's will and acted in a "dishonest fashion by misleading" another client. They also said she embezzled client funds in a "calculated and devious scheme".

Penny's entry on the LinkedIn website for professionals had claimed she worked for global financial giant Bank of New York Mellon between November 2008 and May this year. But she was behind bars during that time. The dates were later changed to when she did work for the bank - from May to December 2008, when she was fired. A bank spokesman said: "As soon as we discovered her conviction, we terminated her employment."

At Edinburgh Sheriff Court, Penny accused her first husband, lawyer David Macadam, 54, of driving her to embezzlement by his "bullying". He was also rapped for misconduct by the SSDT in 2004. They ordered that he could only work as a lawyer under supervision for a five-year period.

When confronted last week, Penny said: "This will destroy me. The dates on LinkedIn are a mistake." She then told her husband to snatch the will from our reporter's hands.

Lawyers stealing from clients to earn 'double fees' while Law Society looks the other way in vast network of legal aid fraud & embezzlement

Last week the Law Society of Scotland went to great lengths to inform newspapers of the prosecution and jailing of ex-solicitor Valerie Macadam for embezzling at least £130,000 of client funds.

The Law Society press release can be read here : Former solicitor Valerie Macadam sentenced to three years for embezzlement

However, when asked if every penny of the embezzlement had been repaid to clients, the Law Society were a little more vague on their reply, preferring actually a "no comment" .. leading to the suspicion that, like in so many other cases, after a solicitor steals clients funds, the money is lost forever .. despite the legal profession's constant claim their "Guarantee Fund" pays out in full to anyone who suffers a loss at the hands of a crooked lawyer.

Laughably, it was left to a newspaper to report the Guarantee Fund had paid back Valerie Macadam's victims, but no figures were mentioned, nor, according to journalists contacting me, were accounts and payments disclosed by the Law Society, leading to suspicions the story was "entirely bogus" and "a pack of lies" - according to one senior law journalist.

However, while Valerie Macadam was sent to jail for three years, and will probably, according to one source, be out on release after just twelve months, little mention was made of another solicitor, Iain Robertson, of Paisley legal firm Robertson & Ross, being found guilty by the Scottish Solicitors Discipline Tribunal of pocketing £21,308 from a client who was already on legal aid.

Iain Robertson is also being probed for possible legal aid fraud, although today when asked for comment on the case, the Scottish Legal Aid Board issued the following statement :

“The Board's policy in any situation where fraud or abuse of legal aid is identified, is to take action to stop it, recover monies and to take the appropriate action which may include; suspension, deregistration (if the solicitor is providing criminal legal assistance), reporting to the prosecuting authorities and to the Law Society of Scotland. We invest substantial resources into investigating fraud and abuse to protect both tax payers and the vast majority of honest legal aid practitioners. However, it is inappropriate for the Board to comment on any case until investigations or other actions are concluded.”

A source at the Law Society of Scotland today claimed "People here don't want to talk about the Paisley case because what Robertson did is rife among Scots solicitors and most clients don't realise if they are on legal aid and are probably so poor they don't need to pay their lawyers".

There was however, no Law Society Press Release available on Mr Robertson being allowed to continue practising after the notoriously sloppy Scottish Solicitors Discipline Tribunal fined him £5000 after finding him guilty of professional misconduct, and ruled the incident "appeared to be a one-off", concluding: "What happened was due to incompetence rather than anything more sinister.”.

However, fortunately for the rest of us, the Sunday Mail newspaper reported the story, and highlighted the fact the solicitor in question “has been reported ot the Procurator Fiscal after a Police probe into an alleged legal aid fraud worth up to £350,000.”

The source at the Law Society went on to say : "The Law Society of Scotland is inundated with complaints about lawyers charging clients huge sums of money while they are on legal aid and we have some reports of lawyers demanding custody of client's state benefits books if they refuse to pay up".

Well, no wonder the Law Society doesn't want to discuss such cases of blatant fraud, and particularly in some cases where outwardly respectable solicitors are effectively stealing people's state benefits to pay for legal work when these same solicitors are claiming legal aid from the state for payment of the same legal work !

Surely, solicitors confiscating clients state benefits & pensions books is some kind of fraud which needs to be investigated by the Police at least, and hard questions asked of the Law Society as to why it has done nothing in such circumstances ?

It is of course personally shocking to me to learn of this as my own mother was a victim of such a fraud where a well known Scottish Borders accountant confiscated her pension book to keep control of the money for himself, which you can read more about here : Scottish Borders accountant confiscates pension book

A client of a well known Edinburgh legal firm which claims not to take on legal aid work, informed me today of their own similar case where they have been forced to hand over more than nine thousand pounds to their lawyer despite the fact the solicitor has been claiming legal aid for their client's case for around four years.

"Our solicitor keeps sending us bills for work yet we have signed eight legal aid claims forms which we are told he is receiving money for. He forced us to sell our car and several items of furniture to give him more cash and is now demanding we sell our house at anything we can get to keep paying him for a case he is basically doing nothing with that has lasted 4 years and got nowhere".

"We now suspect the legal aid board knew nothing of the fees our lawyer has been charging us as we are supposed to be well within the financial limits where a financial contribution from us is necessary".

I recommended today in the case I have quoted, the client should contact the Scottish Legal Aid Board privately and inform them of what has been going on, in terms of how much money their solicitor had demanded & received from them while being in receipt of legal aid. I am also keeping an eye on the case and will make sure it received the due media attention it deserves, in the public interest.

If a client who is on legal aid suspects the same is happening to them, they should contact the Legal Aid Board, report matters, and also let the media know of what their solicitor has been charging them while receiving legal aid at the same time.

Additionally I have heard this week of legal firms holding onto settlements made to clients involved in legal aid funded cases, where secret deductions were made by the legal firms before the remainder, if anything was passed onto the client or the legal aid board. These actions by solicitors may be considered fraudulent and SLAB should be notified immediately.

Contact details for the Scottish Legal Aid Board are as follows :

The Scottish Legal Aid Board
44 Drumsheugh Gardens
Edinburgh
EH3 7SW
telephone: 0131 226 7061. email : general@slab.org.uk

The odds are, if you don't qualify to give a financial contribution to legal aid (which has to be made clear to you from the very start of your legal aid application), but are still being charged for the legal work carried out by your solicitor, there is a problem, and it will probably be the case the solicitor will be doing the same to other clients.

We can't allow the Law Society to whitewash what certainly seems to be a significant area of fraud where the earning of ‘double fees’ by unscrupulous solicitors goes on while the Law Society and the ‘independent’ Scottish Legal Complaints Commission conveniently look the other way.

To highlight the issue at hand, here follows last week’s Sunday Mail report on Iain Robertson :

Legal aid rip-off probe lawyer keeps job

Dec 7 2008 By Steve Dinneen

A LAWYER being probed over alleged legal aid fraud escaped being struck off despite ripping off a client.

Iain Robertson was able to continue practising because the incident was a "one-off".

He has now been accused of fraud in a separate investigation.

The Scottish Solicitors' Discipline Tribunal found Robertson pocketed £21,308 from a woman client while getting legal aid cash for the work.

They fined him £5000 after finding him guilty of professional misconduct.

But they decided not to strike him off, ruling it "appeared to be a one-off" and concluding: "What happened was due to incompetence rather than anything more sinister."

But Robertson has been reported to the procurator fiscal after a police probe into an alleged legal aid fraud worth up to £350,000.

The Sunday Mail revealed in April that the 55-year-old lawyer, a partner in Paisley firm Robertson and Ross, was being investigated.

Police reported him to the fiscal in April.

Robertson said: "We have co-operated fully and are confident the matter will be resolved in our favour.