Practice Management

A criminal silk was not to blame for a man being convicted of importing and supplying large quantities of heroin, the Court of Appeal has decided. Attique Sami argued that “no competent counsel” would have called a witness who gave “highly damaging evidence” against him involving 230kg of heroin with a street value of over £37m.

A business specialising in trade mark advice and registration must stop claiming to be the “UK’s no.1 trade mark service”, the Advertising Standards Authority has ruled. It said Trade Mark Direct made the claim on the basis that it believed it had registered more applications than any other firm in the last three years.

The Serious Fraud Office has bought a document review system backed up by artificial intelligence to improve significantly its document analysis capability – and put out of work barristers who it previously used to identify material subject to legal professional privilege.

A London-based law firm has filed a claim for judicial review against the Law Society’s decision not to reaccredit a solicitor who had been on its mental health panel for nearly a decade. She said the decision meant she has had to stop working in an area about which she is “passionate”, and longstanding clients have had to find new representation.

Smart contracts in cross-border commerce moved a step closer to the mainstream this week when three City law firm giants joined a project that is seeking to create global legal standards for blockchain-backed transactions. We also report on firms’ technology training moves and a knowledge transfer partnership between a law firm and university.

The first element of the Online Court went public today, with a beta test enabling people to issue county court money claims for up to £10,000 more easily. The Ministry of Justice said the civil money claims pilot scheme “begins to deliver the vision… for claims worth up to £25,000 to be solved in an online court”.

The first digital mortgage deed was entered into the Land Register today following collaboration and testing with Coventry Building Society and Enact Conveyancing. Meanwhile, an online property sales platform that uses the blockchain to record property transactions has adopted artificial intelligence in its auction process.

Leading alternative legal services provider Axiom has launched a purpose-built service, incorporating artificial intelligence, to help companies update over 7.5m financial services contracts in the run-up to Brexit. It described this as the largest contract rewriting and updating exercise ever seen.

Mid-sized law firms are convinced that their IT spend is adding to profitability but three out of four make no effort to measure their return on investment, according to new research. It also found that more than two-thirds of firms had no CRM system and more than a quarter had no practice management system.

The Legal Services Board has approved an initial application by the Solicitors Regulation Authority to introduce the Solicitors Qualifying Examination. Despite intense pressure, LSB chief executive Neil Buckley said there were “no grounds” to reject the SRA’s application, setting out the framework for the regime.