A former Clyde & Co associate will go before the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal facing allegations that he sent misleading emails and signed statements of fact he did not have authority to sign.
According to an SRA notice, Rajpal Ahluwalia will face a string of allegations before the tribunal. The allegations are subject to a hearing and are as yet unproven.
Allegations include that he sent an email to a client of the firm that was misleading and signed a statement of truth on a defence in which he certified that the defendant believed that the facts stated were true when he knew that they had not seen them.
He also allegedly claimed he was authorised to sign the defence on behalf of the defendant when he had neither sought nor obtained the authority.
Further, Ahluwalia is accused of making statements to a firm of solicitors between 2013 and 2014 which he knew not to be true, failing within a reasonable time to inform a client about a service of claim and settlement offers, and failing to ensure a defence claim was filed in good time.
The notice from the SRA comes just days after the regulator revealed that the firm and three of its partners had been fined for breaching money laundering and accounting rules.
London-based partners Christopher Duffy, Simon Gamblin and Nick Purnell were all fined £10,000 while the firm was fined £50,000.
The SDT’s judgment in that case was handed down on 21 March but has yet to be published.
There is no suggestion that the cases are related.
Clyde & Co is one of the world’s leading international firms. Last year, it had a turnover of £447m, ranking it 12th in the UK. It has more than 40 offices across the UK and worldwide, around 1,400 lawyers and 375 partners.
In a statement the firm said: ’Rajpal Singh Ahluwalia was an associate in our London aviation team from July 2010 until November 2014. He resigned from the firm following his suspension for an isolated matter that we identified and reported to the SRA. It would not be appropriate to comment further at this time.’
Former Clyde & Co lawyer facing ‘misleading emails’ prosecution
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