A former solicitor’s appeal against strike-off following his exposure in a journalistic sting was totally without merit, the High Court ruled today. In Sheikh Asif Salam v Solicitors Regulation Authority, Mr Justice Calver found that the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal was correct to find that Cheshire sole practitioner Sheikh Asif Salam had been caught 'red-handed' offering to assist in falsifying evidence in an immigration case. 

A recording of his conversation with an undercover journalist was broadcast on the BBC Radio 4 programme File on Four. 

In his appeal last month, Salam claimed that he had been ‘play acting’ with the journalist and that the recordings had been tampered with. Strike-off was an unduly harsh punishment, he argued. 

However dismissing all grounds of appeal, the judge said Salam had produced no evidence of tampering. His play-acting argument was ‘ridiculous’. 

On the sanction, the judge said, the SDT’s finding could not be faulted. 'The dishonesty was grave, consisting of a solicitor actively urging his client (or the person whom he believed to be his client) to break the law. Nor is it a case of no harm being caused: the harm is to the integrity of the solicitors’ profession.'

He concluded: 'In all the circumstances this appeal, which was bound to fail and which I certify as being totally without merit, is dismissed.'

 

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