A solicitor duped a former friend into believing the property they jointly owned had not been sold, a tribunal has found. The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal ruled that Paul Lloyd Jones, admitted in 2003, had been dishonest when he texted to say the property would ‘hopefully be sold soon’, when he knew the sale had gone through and money paid into his account.
The tribunal said Jones was ‘primarily motivated by his resentment’ over a disagreement going back several years. Jones ‘engaged in a prolonged and protracted deception of his one-time friend’. He was struck off and ordered to pay £25,000 costs.
The tribunal heard that Jones was a director of Cardiff firm Insight Legal and had purchased the property in 2006 with Geraint Jones (referred to as GJ) as beneficial joint tenants. In 2011 GJ rejected Jones' suggestion that his cousin buy a share in the property.
In February 2017, Jones instructed his firm to act on his behalf in the sale of the property, which was completed later that year, with net proceeds transferred into his bank account. GJ complained to the Solicitors Regulation Authority in 2019, saying he was unaware the property had been sold until after the event, that his signature had been forged and he had received none of the proceeds.
The SRA, prosecuting, said Jones and GJ exchanged messages during 2017 when the solicitor did not mention that the property was on the market or had been sold. It was dishonest, the SRA submitted, for a solicitor to provide instructions in the sale of a jointly owned property knowing that they were not authorised to do so.
Jones denied misconduct, saying he believed that GJ had agreed the property should be sold and that he had authority to take the actions he did.
The tribunal found that Jones knew that he had instructed the firm to act in the sale without the authority or consent of GJ. He further knew that GJ could not provide authority to give instructions on a sale he did not know was taking place. This was compounded by Jones sending a stream of misleading messages which did not reveal what was happening with the property.
The tribunal ruling added: ‘[Jones’] explanations for the contents of his messages were wholly incredible. He was an extremely experienced property lawyer who fully understood the process of the conveyance. In contrast, GJ was vulnerable, suffering from mental health difficulties and had no knowledge of conveyancing processes.’
