A manager and solicitor at a leading Midlands firm has been struck off after being convicted of exposing himself to school-age girls.
Mark Pittaway, formerly with Thursfields Solicitors, was convicted of five charges of indecent exposure involving exposing his genitals to cause alarm or distress.
The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal heard that this misconduct ran from January 2018 and May 2021. One of the victims said that Pittaway had flashed his genitals at her ‘nearly every day’ for two years while she was on her way to and from school. She had been 14 when it started and she said it made her ‘so upset and scared I couldn’t walk to school’.
The allegations of indecent exposure related to times when Pittaway was out running in the Portland area of Dorset. He denied the allegations, stating that he was a seasoned runner and that if any exposure had occurred while he had been out running it was purely accidental and as a result of the length of his shorts.
Having viewed some of the CCTV, he conceded his genitals were on display but said he had not appreciated that at the time. Four eye-witnesses gave evidence at his trial, three of whom had identified him in a line-up.
Pittaway was convicted in March 2022 at the West Dorset Magistrates’ Court and sentenced to 12 months’ imprisonment, suspended for 24 months. He was also given a curfew for 12 weeks, ordered to do 250 hours of unpaid work and given a sexual harm prevention order for 10 years. He was banned from exercising in a public place unless he wears trousers or shorts no higher than knee and with no front fastenings. He is also banned from running or jogging at school opening and closing times or within sight of any school.
The solicitor since 1986 had featured several times in local media for his running for charitable causes and had completed more than 10 marathons.
Pittaway had agreed with the SRA to be struck off. Rubber-stamping that sanction, the tribunal said: ‘Mr Pittaway’s admitted conduct had been disgraceful and totally unbecoming of a member of the solicitors’ profession. Mr Pittaway did not provide any mitigation.
‘This was not a case in which Mr Pittaway’s behaviour had little or no nexus with his professional life. His criminal conviction was of a degree and nature entirely incompatible with maintaining the reputation of the profession in the eyes of the public.’ He will also pay £2,850 costs.
