The name of a convicted arsonist - Stephen "Rossi" Walsh - was the common feature in a list of 12 files sought by a Law Society investigator from a Dublin solicitor in 1993, the High Court was told yesterday. But the solicitor, Mr Giles P. Kennedy, who practises in Eccles Street, Dublin, told Mr Justice Kearns that these files related to named people for whom he had declined to act.
Mr Kennedy alleges that the Law Society, under the guise of examining his company's accounts, was in fact looking for individuals making bogus personal injuries claims. He alleges that the society had a "hidden agenda".
Mr Kennedy is seeking an order quashing a Law Society decision to look for an inquiry by its disciplinary tribunal into his conduct. He has submitted a claim for £737,000 special damages (loss of fees, income and other costs) and is also asking the court to award him general damages. The society denies the allegations and claims that he is not entitled to damages.
Mr Kennedy said that a Law Society accountant, Ms Aisling Foley, came to his office in June 1993 and got a computer print-out of 2,500 clients. There was about £640,000 in the clients' bank account at the time. His book-keeper told him that Ms Foley did not seem to be interested in the financial end of the business. It was brought to his attention that she had prepared a list of 98 clients. On the list were 12 names of people his firm had declined to act for; he had specifically detailed perhaps two years before that there might be a "conflict of interest".
Asked by Mr Justice Kearns what he meant by "conflict of interest", Mr Kennedy explained that when he felt a client did not have a case, but the client felt they did have a case, in those circumstance he [Mr Kennedy] felt he could not act. The common feature of the cases had been "Rossi" Walsh, Mr Kennedy said. He had previously acted for Walsh's daughter, who had been involved in a serious accident and had received substantial damages. That was how his firm had started to act for the Walsh family.
The case resumes next Tuesday.