SDT: Compliance responsibilities made breaches more egregious
A solicitor whose firm acted for both sides in litigation over a debt, despite him being told of the obvious conflict, has been suspended for six months.
The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT) heard that Satnam Singh Talwar did not respond either when a paralegal at his firm pointed out the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) rules or when debt collection firm Equivo did the same in declining his instructions, telling him that he was “clearly conflicted”.
The tribunal said the case “served as a stark reminder to members of the profession to take great care and caution not to place themselves in a position where they act when there is a conflict of interest or the risk of one occurring”.
Mr Talwar, 51 and admitted in 2003, was director and owner of City firm QC Law/Queens Court Law, and held all the compliance roles at the time.
According to a statement of agreed facts and outcome approved by the tribunal, the SRA explained that QC Law acted for Client A over a debt and obtained default judgment against Ms L on 8 July 2022.
Four days later, Ms L instructed QC Law to apply to set aside the judgment, becoming Client B.
As required by the conflicts policy Mr Talwar had only approved that April, a paralegal drew his attention to the conflict, but Mr Talwar went ahead and filed the application to set aside the judgment.
This was accompanied by a statement from the client, drafted by Mr Talwar, which acknowledged that she had instructed the same law firm as the claimant, but that there were safeguards in place to avoid any conflicts.
On the same day, Client A instructed QC Law to enforce the debt and it contacted Equivo. But eight days later, it asked Equivo to stop.
Equivo declined to act on the matter on 12 August and Mr Talwar replied that, as the compliance officer, he would consider what to do next. But it was not under October that the firm ceased to act for both clients, with the paralegal having sought advice from the SRA’s ethics helpline.
Soon after, Client A’s new solicitor asked why Mr Talwar did not seek her consent to act for Client B and why it took three months to inform her that it was.
Mr Talwar replied to say that he had decided in mid-August to stop acting, accepted he had breached the SRA code, that he would make a self-report to the SRA.
He did not, however, and the SRA was alerted six months later by Client A’s solicitor.
Mr Talwar admitted he had acted with a lack of integrity and been reckless in acting when was there a conflict.
In “non-agreed mitigation”, Mr Talwar said he believed Client A’s file had been closed after the default judgment was obtained and that “she was, therefore, an ex-client” when Client B approached the firm.
Mr Talwar said he had asked a colleague to obtain Client A’s consent to it acting for Client A, which he “understood” she had, and that Client B had consented too.
However, the SRA noted that the firm could not act even if they had and in any case failed to provide evidence of it.
Mr Talwar said he did not have “any involvement” with Client A’s file, although the client-care letter said he had overall supervision of the firm. He said Chinese walls were in place and the teams acting for each client did not have access to each other’s files and worked in separate rooms.
He admitted that the failure to self-report among the multiple actions that had lacked integrity, while his actions were reckless and damaged public trust.
The SDT said: “Matters were made more egregious by the fact that he was the firm’s COLP and COFA throughout and despite holding these responsible positions his error was spotted by his paralegal in July 2022 and brought to his attention. He failed to act upon this information and continued to act.
“His failure to self-report spoke volumes as to the respondent’s cavalier attitude to the rules of professional conduct, though it was to be noted that his admissions now demonstrated an element of insight and contrition.”
Mr Talwar was suspended for six months, to be followed by a three-year restriction order preventing him from acting as a COLP, COFA, manager or owner of a law firm.
He was also ordered to pay costs of £17,800.
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