LONDON (Within The Law) - A solicitor has been struck off for making improper transfers to prop up his struggling firm the Law Gazette reports. Christopher John Bentley who was sole principal of Norfolk based Cole Bentley & Co Solicitors used nearly £30,000 to prop up his ailing business.
The tribunal heard how he made six improper transfers from his client account to his office's current bank account across four client files. The money, totaling £29,345, was used to pay office overheads, wages and the respondent’s drawings.
At the time the office's current account was hovering dangerously close to its overdraft limit of £25,000.
During the hearing, the tribunal heard there was a ‘clear pattern between the financial position of the firm and the improper payments. They rejected the idea that this was a coincidence or a series of coincidences. It was, they said, the ‘intentional and deliberate conduct of the respondent’.
Bentley was also found to have fabricated invoices to justify some of the transfers and recorded sending out cheques when none had been sent out.
According to the tribunal ‘The timing of the improper payments matched those times when the respondent needed an injection of cash into the office account. It was clear from that timing that the respondent’s actions were planned. He had breached the trust placed in him by his clients to operate proper stewardship of their monies.’
The tribunal struck Bentley off and ordered him to pay £18,794 in costs. He did not attend the hearing and was not represented.
(Written by Tom Cropper, Edited Klaudia Fior)