A solicitor named in a Daily Mail undercover sting targeting immigration lawyers told a journalist posing as a prospective client that marriage would help an asylum claim, the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal heard today.
Muhammad Afzar Ahmad, admitted in April 2013, was working at Birmingham-based Kingswright Solicitors Limited when three undercover reporters attended the office for a meeting. Kingswright Solicitors was intervened into in July 2023. Immigration work accounted for 99% of the firm’s practice.
The SDT heard that one of the undercover journalists was posing as an migrant who had arrived in the UK illegally while the other two reporters were posing as his uncle and son.
James Counsell KC, for the Solicitors Regulation Authority, said: ‘This case arises out of an investigation by the Daily Mail newspaper into solicitors providing immigration advice and services [involving] three journalists, one posing as someone who entered the country illegally, one positing as the uncle and the other the uncle’s son.’
The SDT’s three-person panel heard that Ahmad had a meeting with the three reporters and told the undercover journalist that he ‘should claim he left his home due to fear for his life’.
Counsell added that Ahmad also suggested 'what would effectively be a sham marriage’. Ahmad is alleged to have breached principles 1, 2, 4 and 5 of the SRA Principles 2019 and paragraph 1.4 of the code of conduct 2019.
Ahmad denies the allegation. He denies suggesting a false narrative and argues his words have been misinterpreted.
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The journalists, who claimed the potential client had travelled from India, were under ‘strict instructions as to what they could ask and what they should not ask and what information should be given in advice’, Counsell said. The journalists were told they could not ask leading questions, could not themselves suggest making an asylum application, and if asked would be clear that there was no basis for a legal claim for asylum.
They covertly recorded the meeting with Ahmad which had been conducted in English and Punjabi.
Reading from a transcript of the conversation, the SDT was told Ahmad allegedly said: ‘We need to establish that he ran from his country due to fear to his life’. He said the ‘five ingredients’ for asylum are political opinion, religious matters, caste, race or particular social group.
Counsell said the conversation then moved on to ‘speak about how to obtain a Khalistan card or membership’. Khalistan is a political movement which has been proscribed as a terrorist organisation, the SDT heard.
Ahmad is the third solicitor to have appeared before the tribunal after being targeted in the newspaper’s 2023 sting operation. The SDT cleared the other two solicitors, whose tribunals were held last year, of any misconduct.
The substantive hearing continues.
