The Solicitors Regulation Authority failed to act even as a complainant reported how a solicitor was blackmailing him to have sex and threatened to come to his home, it has emerged.
Solicitor Andrew Milne, 64, lost his appeal against a stalking conviction on Monday following a ruling handed down at Snaresbrook Crown Court. In the ruling, His Honour Judge Timothy Greene noted how legal blogger Daniel Cloake had forwarded to the SRA the dozens of emails he received from Milne in the three months prior to August 2024.
Milne sent correspondence labelled ‘without prejudice’ which said Cloake had a choice of having sex with him or being sued by him. In them Milne referred to Cloake’s address and suggested he might lose his home.
Other emails referred to what the judge found to be lies about the pair having an existing sexual relationship. Cloake told the court the contact was ‘relentless’ and it felt like a ‘tidal wave of stuff coming towards you… there seemed to be no escape’.
By mid-July 2024 the emails referred to Milne suing for a six-figure sum and the solicitor saying he was planning to come to Cloake’s home, again with sexual references.
The court heard that Cloake had told the SRA at this stage he was worried about Milne coming to his house and he felt frightened and threatened.
The judge said it was not disputed by the parties that Cloake had been forwarding all these emails to the SRA, sometimes individually and sometimes in groups. But there was no substantive response from the regulator, prompting Cloake to contact the police after Milne did come to his home.
The blogger told the court: ‘I was hoping the SRA would do something, I thought it was an egregious breach of SRA conditions. I didn’t realise quite how useless the SRA are.’
The judge stressed the court’s role was not to decide whether the SRA had dealt appropriately with Milne. In dismissing the stalking appeal, he concluded that Milne had repeatedly lied in his police statement and to the court.
The SRA said it cannot comment on matters which are subject to ongoing disciplinary proceedings. Milne is due to appear before the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal today for a preliminary hearing, ahead of a substantive hearing next year.
Milne is charged by the SRA with stalking Cloake between March and August 2024 and with being convicted of that offence in February 2026 at Stratford Magistrates Court. The SRA decision notice states that the referral to the SDT was made in April this year – two months after the magistrates court proceedings concluded.
Conditions were placed on Milne’s practising certificate after the magistrates' conviction.
