By Ashley Young And Sheila Mckenzie-
The Solicitors Regulation Authority has been hit with a £63,000 cost bill order after what the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal described as an inadequate, wrong, and shambolic approach.
The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal concluded it found no case to answer against Nabeel Sheikh over the costs incurred and claimed for following a criminal case handled by his firm. It follows a shut down of Sheikh’s London firm Neumans LLP, in 2017, where he was senior partner and compliance officer over suspected dishonesty.
Mr. Sheikh had been accused of seriously inflating the bill of costs to defend a client for alleged criminal conduct, by quoting several hours not actually reflected in the work done. He had been fined £500,ooo for the alleged fraud. One of his key arguments in defence that the police had investigated the case and not conducted an arrest or pursued it any further, and that the SRA had not provided any key witnesses to support their claim of fraud.
The tribunal eventually agreed with mr. Sheikh’s position and concluded that the SRA failed to properly conduct an independent investigation, or to speak to potential key witnesses, or establish the costs by speaking to witnesses. Its fine of £63k is a heavy bill for an organisation that itself is owed costs for prosecuting numerous cases.
The tribunal said: ‘The [SRA] was under a duty to investigate and to ensure that only allegations that were supported by the evidence were placed before the tribunal. It failed to do so in relation to these proceedings.’
The case related to a client who faced 14 criminal charges including two related to offences of placing a medicinal product on the market without authorisation.In its retainer letter to Client A dated 30 January 2006 the Firm set out its proposed fees and expenses for the matter (“the Original Retainer”) . It cited hourly rates of between £150 plus VAT (trainee) and £350 plus VAT (senior partner, Counsel’s brief fees of £250,000 plus VAT for Leading Counsel and £125,000 plus VAT for Junior Counsel
The client was convicted of two of the charges, fined £500, and made subject to a confiscation order amounting to £211,604. This was subsequently squashed by the Court of Appeal later quashed the conviction and granted his application for a defendants’ costs order (DCO), allowing him to recover his legal expenses in full from central funds.
The SRA alleged that Sheikh’s firm, previously known as Sabir Selby, had misled various parties, including the court, into believing he had agreed to limit charges to £275,000, only to later present a bill of costs to the Court of Appeal seeking payment of £2.9m.
On 28 September 2012, the police commenced their investigation into the matter, and suspended a prior investigation by the Court Of Appeal, Master Egan’s investigation. However, after the closing of the police investigation, Master Ergan’s investigation recommenced on 28 October 2014 following the police’s decision to close their investigation and having returned the papers to the court.
Master Egan completed his investigation and finalised his report on 20 May 2015. He concluded that he was satisfied that there was clear evidence to support a case of fraud in the claim for costs. A summary of his key findings was that;
CLEAR EVIDENCE
Master Egan concluded there was ‘clear evidence’ to support a case of fraud, based on what he described as false claims for 2,783 hours’ Crown court preparation. Master Egan concluded that “claims for 2,783 hours of the 3,047 hours Crown Court preparation by the Respondent between 27 January 2006 and 11 September 2007 are false” ( 91% of the costs claimed);
The creation of the Bill of Costs and the non-disclosure of eight invoices paid by Client A “was dishonest and designed to facilitate a payment from Central Funds.
Neumans rejected Master Egan’s criticism, arguing that his allegation of false claims was misconceived. The firm argued that it received advice from specialist costs counsel and advised the client to take independent advice.
Sheikh also said Master Egan’s report was no more than an opinion, and his stated role was investigator, not fact finder. It was also argued that the investigation examined no witnesses, and the police, having been notified of the fraud suspicion, opted not to arrest or even interview Sheikh.
After it emerged that the SRA carried out no independent investigation of the allegations and had called no witnesses of fact or expert evidence, the tribunal found no case to answer on any charges, saying it had received no evidence from the SRA as to what costs it considered to be ‘properly due’. Instead, the tribunal was invited by the SRA to draw ‘inferences’ from Master Egan’s investigation.
A Spokesperson for the SRA told The Eye Of Media.Com: ”We are studying the judgement and examining our options. We have 21 days to appeal”