Paul William George Brook

• Application 9994-2008
• Admitted 1978
• Hearing 26 May 2009
• Reasons 23 December 2009

The SDT ordered that the respondent, of King & Brook, 77 Saltergate, Chesterfield, Derbyshire S40 1JS, should pay a fine of £20,000. The allegations against the respondent were that he had dishonestly, alternatively with culpable recklessness, improperly utilised clients monies for the benefit of himself or other clients not entitled thereto; he had acted in breach of the Solicitors Accounts Rules 1998 in that, in breach of rule 7, he had failed to remedy breaches of the rules promptly upon discovery, contrary to rule 22 he had withdrawn from clients’ account monies other than in accordance with the provisions of the said rule, and, contrary to rule 32 ,he had failed properly to effect reconciliations of clients’ money as provided by the rule; he had acted in breach of undertakings given in the course of his practise as a solicitor; he had failed, contrary to rule 13 of the Solicitors Practice Rules 1990, to effect or maintain adequate supervision of the cashiers department; and he had breached rules 7, 22 and 32 of the 1998 rules in that the books of account had not been properly maintained since 30 June 2008 (the date of the last client bank reconciliation) moreover the reconciliation was not in the suggested format, no transactions had been recorded on the clients’ ledger account since the end of July 2008, and at 30 June 2008 there were many client ledgers with credit balances on the office side of the ledger. (In view of those matters the forensic investigation officer had been unable to calculate the firm’s total liability to clients as at the inspection date of 31 October 2008. However, he had been able to ascertain that there had been a minimum cash shortage of £210,443.96 as at 30 October 2008. No action had been taken in respect of the minimum cash shortage.) The SDT accepted that the respondent had trusted his senior partner, Mr King (now deceased), and had not suspected him nor had colluded with him in any fraudulent activities. However, some £2,000,000 had gone missing; monies out of the pockets of ordinary people that would have to be repaid via insurers or the Compensation Fund. While the respondent had not been found dishonest or culpably reckless, the SDT found that he had been negligent in his stewardship of client monies. There had been clear breaches of the Solicitors Accounts Rules that the respondent should have picked up had he not passed all responsibility to his partner. Such abrogation of financial and accounting responsibilities was not appropriate for a partner and in the present particular case had led to substantial losses.

In the circumstances, the SDT considered that a large financial penalty was appropriate, and that the respondent should be allowed to continue to practise subject to the existing condition on his practising certificate (namely that he should not hold, receive or have access to client monies and that he was not a signatory to any client account) as imposed and determined by the Solicitors Regulation Authority, to include appropriate management accounts courses.

The respondent was ordered to pay costs of £14,217.