The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT) has awarded costs of £25,500 against the Law Society for its 'unreasonable and plainly misconceived' continuation of action against a solicitor.


The Society had charged Charles Knapper, a solicitor with Plymouth firm Fursdon Knapper, in the wake of a 1999 High Court judgment finding Mr Knapper to have been dishonest on several points in an action involving a former business partner. This judgment was set aside in its entirety in May 2005 and the SDT recorded that Mr Knapper had shown he was not dishonest.



The exoneration of Mr Knapper undercut the Law Society's case and an SDT hearing, in October 2005, gave it permission to withdraw its allegations. The Society duly did so, but then served a revised statement, also in October 2005. The recent SDT hearing ruled that this revised statement contained no fresh evidence to support the Society's case and that its continued proceedings, from October 2005 until last month, were 'unreasonable and plainly misconceived'. Accordingly, the SDT allowed the allegations to be withdrawn, but ordered the Society to pay Mr Knapper's defence costs for this period.



Mr Knapper said: 'The struggle to clear my name has bankrupted me and made my wife ill. But I'm glad I stuck to my guns.'



A spokesman for the Law Society Regulation Board said: 'If we knew then what we know now, we might have done things differently.'



Jonathan Rayner