A clinical negligence solicitor who tried to pass off a backdated letter as evidence in court has been struck off the roll. Gabriel Awosika, admitted in 2012, had mistakenly failed to serve his clients’ claim form on the NHS trust within the four-month deadline.
Instead, the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal heard, he had served the claim on the defendant solicitor Bevan Brittan which was not instructed to accept service of proceedings. Awosika, who worked for London firm Astute Dynamic, then signed and served a witness statement insisting he had served in time.
Bevan Brittan had sought an order that the proceedings had not been validly served and the matter came before the court in January 2020. Awosika continued to insist he had served validly and even produced a letter which purported to have been served to the defendant before the deadline. But the court found against him, with His Honour Judge Roberts concluding that the letter purporting to have been served on the trust was prepared on a later date and backdated.
The court found crucial differences between the version sent wrongly to Bevan Brittan and that which was purported to have been sent at the same time to the NHS trust. The reference, date and address were in different fonts, while the signature in one letter was initials in one version and a full signature in the other.
Awosika did not appear before the tribunal but made written representations to the SRA in 2023. He was critical of HHJ Roberts’ findings and claims as they were not based on full facts. He said he did not appeal because the judge had exercised his discretion to allow the claim to be reissued.
He claimed to have typed out the letter to the trust and printed it off without having saved it on his laptop, but insisted that it was created at the same time as the letter to Bevan Brittan.
He told the SRA he would never backdate a letter to make it look like it was sent earlier.
Awosika accepted that his witness statements and the oral evidence he gave to the court were at times ‘rushed, unclear and inconsistent’, but said this arose from significant personal distractions and poor recollection, rather than any intention to mislead.
The tribunal ruled that the letter had not been served when it was purported to have been and instead had been backdated. There were no reasons found to depart from the judge’s conclusions and dishonesty was established.
The tribunal judgment added: ‘[Awosika] had full control of the situation. He was an experienced solicitor, by his own admission. He made a mistake, by failing to serve the NHS defendant trust directly, and then covered up his mistake by fabricating a letter. Lying to the court and to the other parties in a case was a serious offence that gravely undermined public trust in the profession.’
Awosika was struck off and ordered to pay around £28,500 costs.
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