A solicitor mounted a ‘campaign of harassment’ against the chief executive of the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal and a member of the panel which struck him off, the High Court heard today.
Farid El Diwany is alleged to have breached an injunction preventing him from harassing Geraldine Newbold and Colin Chesterton, formerly a solicitor member of the tribunal, or any current or former member of the SDT 19 times in the space of 11 days in November last year.
The 63-year-old is said to have left a voicemail message on the mobile phone of Simon Tinkler, a partner at magic circle firm Clifford Chance who dismissed El Diwany’s application to be restored to the roll last year, three days before his bid to return to the profession was heard by the tribunal.
El Diwany was struck off in 2019 after he was twice convicted of harassment in Norway, in 2001 and 2003, and failed to tell the regulator. An appeal against that decision was rejected by the High Court, as was an application for permission to appeal.
Last month, his judicial review against the Solicitors Regulation Authority over its decision not to investigate his complaint against two members of the SDT which struck him off – one of whom was Chesterton – was refused as being totally without merit.
El Diwany appeared remotely before Mr Justice Sweeting today, arguing that his communications with the claimants were ‘innocuous’. ‘There was nothing illegal or harassing about them,’ he said.
Newbold and Tinkler also appeared remotely, which David Reade QC, representing the SDT, Newbold and Chesterton, said was because they did not want to be ‘present in the same courtroom’ as El Diwany.
Tinkler told the court he has sat as a member of the SDT ‘for over a decade and have done several hundred hearings and I have … never before had any contact from any of the individuals outside of direct within the tribunal walls’.
El Diwany apologised for being ‘blunt’ with Tinkler and said he would not attempt to contact the claimants again, adding that they should ‘rest easy and forgive and forget’.
The hearing continues.
