A junior lawyer who asked a colleague to hide a file to cover up a lack of progress has been struck off the roll.
Demi Perrin, formerly with Blackpool firm Blackhurst Budd, contacted the colleague in early 2023 asking her to hide the file. Perrin had been off work for two weeks for health reasons at the time.
The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal heard that the colleague refused to hide the file and reported the matter to her line manager. When the firm looked up the file, it was found that Perrin had not lodged a first registration application with HM Land Registry as she was supposed to have done.
Called into a meeting with the managing director, Perrin insisted the application had been sent, despite no action having been taken on the file since July 2022.
Perrin, now 31, also denied ever asking her colleague to hide the file and said she was ‘confused’ why that was being said. Further checks confirmed Land Registry had never received an application. Perrin initially maintained that the firm’s system had not recorded her work before admitted she had not sent it.
She was then signed off work by her GP for three months and when she returned, she admitted having lied to the managing director. In an email to the firm, she said that in hindsight she was not mentally or physically ready to return to the office following a spell in hospital, and that she made a serious error of judgement under extreme circumstances.
Perrin had joined the firm in 2019 and was subsequently awarded a training contract. She worked in the family department following qualification in June 2022. She was dismissed for gross misconduct in 2023 and has not worked as a solicitor since.
Perrin made an agreed outcome with the Solicitors Regulation Authority that she should be struck off. In mitigation, she repeatedly informed the SRA she would be willing to voluntarily remove herself from the roll due to medical conditions. The tribunal made no order for costs.
