The Gazette 1958-61

The Lord Chief Justice, giving judgment, said that the charges against the appellant fell under three heads ; first, that he withdrew a sum of £258 6d. in July, 1957, from his clients' account and paid it over to a person who had no such money in the account. That had undoubtedly occurred. It was unnecessary to go into details, but it was quite clear that it was an isolated instance which arose quite innocently in error and, the moment it was pointed out, it was put right. It involved no element of dishonesty whatever and his Lordship did not think that the committee had thought that it had. The real gravamen of the case against the appellant concerned the second charge—in effect, that he had failed to give proper attention to the affairs of a client. The position arose that he was reported to the Law Society, warned that his practising certificate would not be renewed unless certain matters arising out of this charge were put in order, and yet he continued to practise. The third charge, of practising without a current practising certificate, was a matter arising out of the second charge. On the face of the findings the appellant had failed to answer letters over a period of three to four years, and those who complained about him to the Law Society were fully justified in doing so. Most un fortunately the appellant completely failed to give any valid explanation to the committee, though he did say that it was because the matter had become, as he put it, repugnant to him. Speaking for himself, his Lordship thought that that was no explanation whatever and as an excuse was one which would rather anger any committee ; it was difficult to think that any committee would have come to any other decision but to suspend the appellant. In the Divisional Court the appeal was by way of rehearing, and although it had not been challenged that there was some failure to give attention to the affairs of a client, the facts had been put against a background which threw a completely new fight on what had occurred. It was not a case of a solicitor saying that the matter was repugnant to him and that he was going to shelve it and do nothing about it; his Lordship was satisfied that the appellant had been put in a very difficult position by one of his clients. The Court had been greatly assisted by the attitude of the Law Society who had accepted the facts now put forward without formal proof and had gone further and said that on those facts there was a strong case for mitigation. His Lordship, while satisfied that the appellant had brought upon himself the order made by the committee, felt that had the full facts been brought out the proper punishment would have been one of reprimand and not suspension. His Lordship would vary the order in that way.

or a witness having immunity from arrest within the precincts of the court. That privilege, if privilege there was, was a privilege of the court to ensure that justice was done in court and for that purpose to prevent anybody properly before the court from being arrested. In so far as it was said to be a privilege of the person attending the court, it was no more than that they were entitled to rely on the Judge of that court seeing that Justice was not inter fered with by their being arrested. It was perfectly clear that there was nothing to suggest that a person was privileged from arrest in a court if the arrest was done on the order of that court, and indeed it would be very surprising if that were not so. It had long been the practice for a person properly before the court to be committed by the court and arrested in court not only if he was guilty of a "special" contempt but also in the case of ordinary contempt. Accordingly in his Lordship's judgment the applica tion failed. (In re Hunt-[i959] 2 W.L.R. 95). Solicitor defendant in person who was reticent about giving explanations before the Disciplinary Committee repri manded. The Lord Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Donovan, and Mr. Justice Ashworth on hearing fresh facts, allowed this appeal by a solicitor, Mr. William Ingle, prac tising at Leeds, from an order of the Disciplinary Committee of the Law Society dated August 14, 1958, suspending him from practice for one year, and substituted a reprimand for the order of suspension. Mr. Lyons, for the appellant, said that he would not criticise the suspension as improper on the facts before the committee. The appellant, who was somewhat reticent and halting in his speech, was sufficiently unwise to appear before the Law Society unrepresented and had given an inadequate explana tion in what was a complicated matter. He was a man of very high, almost Victorian, principles and it was hoped to satisfy the Court that there was a true explanation which put the facts in a different light. The appellant's suspension had received prominent publicity in the Yorkshire Press, so that laymen might have thought that he had been tampering with his clients' money, and the Court was asked to make it clear that there was no question of dishonesty. An unsolicited affidavit had been received from the solicitor who was the complainant before the Law Society, and there was a bundle of 5 2 affidavits from other solicitors practising in Leeds and Bradford who without exception spoke of the appellant as a man of unusual probity and said that never in any of their dealings with him had he been guilty of any lack of diligence or courtesy.