DELAYS IN the criminal prosecution system in relation to white-collar crime seem to be endemic and are totally unacceptable, according to the chairman of the Solicitors’ Disciplinary Tribunal, who has just released his report for 2011.
In it Frank Daly proposes the recruiting of unemployed solicitors, barristers and accountants into specialist units of the Garda Bureau of Fraud Investigation to deal with the ever-increasing complexity of white-collar crime. “Until this happens, nothing will happen and the delays will lengthen,” he said.
He said the tribunal was satisfied to note that two solicitors who had been referred by the president of the High Court to the DPP had finally been charged. However, it was concerning that these cases had originally been referred nearly four years ago.
The Solicitors’ Disciplinary Tribunal is a statutory tribunal composed of 20 solicitors and 10 lay people. It hears complaints of misconduct against solicitors. These can be brought by the Law Society, if it uncovers malpractice in a solicitor’s practice, or by members of the public. The tribunal can make a finding of misconduct or, in more serious cases, can refer the matter to the High Court where the president of that court considers more serious sanctions, including striking the solicitor off the Roll of Solicitors.Thirty-seven solicitors have been struck off the Roll of Solicitors over the past decade, the report states. The bulk were in the past three years.
The number of findings of misconduct against solicitors exploded in 2008, when there were 80 instances, up from 35 the previous year. This included 35 referrals to the High Court, up from 12 in 2007.
Last year, there were 78 findings of misconduct, though this included multiple complaints against certain solicitors, so the actual number of individual solicitors against whom complaints were made was 43. Twenty-four of these were referred to the High Court.
Findings of misconduct were made by the tribunal in 18 per cent of all the cases heard. One solicitor against whom a finding of misconduct was made in 2011 had 17 previous complaints upheld against him, and another had 10 previous complaints.
Almost two-thirds (63 per cent) of all complaints in 2011 related to conveyancing, and a further 23 per cent concerned irregularities in solicitors’ accounts. One of these was for allowing a deficit of over €1 million in the account which held clients’ funds, while another concerned the payment of wages out of the client account.
SOLICITORS' DISCIPLINARY TRIBUNAL BY THE NUMBERS:
37
Number of solicitors who have been struck off the Roll of Solicitors in the past decade
18
Percentage of cases in which findings of misconduct were heard