July 2004 |
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Title and
description of item or excerpt. |
Links - the
full story |
Date posted
on UnjustIS |
Lawyers attack independent
regulation plan
SCOTLAND’S advocates have
condemned plans to set up an independent body to regulate the legal
profession. The government is looking at stripping the Law Society of its
power to investigate lawyers amid growing concerns about the way it handles
complaints. "Many lawyers just do what they like and get away with it - it’s
a scandal." |
The Scotsman |
01 Aug |
£1.2m fraud of Black Rod's son
His father was Sir Frank Twiss, a
war hero who survived a Japanese PoW camp and went on to become Admiral of
the Fleet and the House of Lords’ Black Rod. With his public-school
education, connections and charm,Roddam Twiss could have aspired to emulate
his father’s achievements. But today he sits in Belmarsh prison, awaiting
sentencing for a £1.2million fraud. |
This is London |
30 Jul |
OFT takes over presidency of
International Consumer Network
The UK is to take over the
presidency of the International Consumer Protection and Enforcement Network
(ICPEN) from 1 August 2004. This will be led by Christine Wade, OFT Director
for Consumer Regulation Enforcement. |
Office
of Fair Trading |
30 Jul |
Bank wins landmark appeal over
legal privilege
The Bank of England has won a
landmark appeal over legal privilege, assuaging fears that lawyers could be
required to disclose more details of their communications with clients. |
Financial Times |
30 Jul |
Double investigations victory
for MEN
The Manchester Evening News has
scooped a double victory after two of its investigations resulted in two
conmen being brought to justice on the same day. The newspaper reported how
45-year-old lawyer Liaqat Malik had been struck off... |
Hold the Front Page |
30 Jul |
Freshfields chief takes senior
BBC role
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer
senior partner Anthony Salz has been appointed as the vice chairman of the
BBC for a four-year term starting on 1 August. |
Legal Week |
29 Jul |
Britain's top fraud fighter
(?)
RUNNING Britain's Serious Fraud Office must at times seem like a no-win
task. The investigator-cum-prosecutor is subjected to constant jibes for its
lack of speed and success, which has earned it the unfortunate nickname of
the Serious Farce Office. In America, those convicted of financial crime,
even iconic figures such as lifestyle guru Martha Stewart, are marched off
in chains. British financial wrongdoers are more likely to be found
luxuriating on a sunny foreign beach. |
This is London |
29 Jul |
Fat-cat lawyers in dock for
soaring costs of legal aid
Barristers and solicitors working
on just six criminal trials cost the taxpayer a quarter of the legal aid
budget for the Crown Court last year, a committee of MPs reported yesterday. |
Independent |
28 Jul |
Pay barristers peanuts and
you'll get shysters
The heart hardly bleeds for
criminal barristers on £80,000 a year, but you may think differently if
you're on the wrong side of the dock and find yourself represented, not by a
George Carman, but by a second-rate shyster. |
Telegraph |
28 Jul |
You the jury - and judge
What was it about John Dyson that
inspired his fellow jurors to chose him as their foreman at a London crown
court earlier this month? Was it his clean-cut image? Or was it his natural
air of authority? |
Guardian |
28 Jul |
Fraud trial dropped after
blunder
An ex-banker charged with
conspiracy to defraud walked free after a judge threw out a major Serious
Fraud Office case because of a prosecution blunder.... This led to formal not
guilty verdicts in favour of financial consultant Imdab Ullah, 35, of, St
Johns Wood, London, and solicitors Michael Wilson-Smith, 59, of Haywards
Heath, West Sussex; Peter Barnett, 48, of Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire,
and Minesh Ruperalia, 38, of Leicester...As a result the £2 million cost of
the SFO case, as well as an estimated combined defence of “at least” £10
million, will have to be met out of public coffers. |
BBC
The Scotsman |
27 Jul |
MPs warn on legal-aid means
tests
Government plans to reintroduce
legal-aid means tests for defendants facing criminal trials create a
"substantial risk" of added delays in the criminal justice system and could
provoke costly human rights challenges from those who are denied aid, a
committee of MPs will warn today. |
Guardian |
27 Jul |
Suspected fraudsters move into
mobile phone sales
Two of Britain's biggest
suspected fraudsters, ordered by the courts to repay duped creditors $300m
(£164m), have reinvented themselves as mobile phone salesmen negotiating
deals to market and supply thousands of phones to UK users on behalf of
Hutchison 3G, T-Mobile and O2. |
Guardian |
26 Jul |
Auditors put on fraud alert
Auditors have been put on a
heightened state of alert for fraudulent accounting as companies prepare to
switch from national to international financial reporting rules. Auditors
have been told to take robust stances with clients, and be prepared to
increase the number of accounts they refuse to sign off as accurate. |
Financial Times |
26 Jul |
Half-yearly fraud figures soar
Fraud is soaring in Scotland with
figures for the first six months of this year already topping the total for
2003, according to a new survey. The value of fraud reported up to the end
of June was £8.51m - compared with the total of £7.21m reported in the whole
of 2003. |
BBC |
26 Jul |
Middle-class professionals are
Britain's hidden poor
The plight of Britain's hidden
poor - middle class professionals who have slipped down the social scale -
is highlighted in a report published today. It shows that 3.8 million
people, 14% of the country's professional classes, are living on incomes
below the poverty line. |
Guardian |
26 Jul |
Fraud
robs bereaved of £150m (The Times - subscription service)
Beneficiaries are being swindled
out of millions of pounds by trusted advisers. David Budworth investigates
the rise in probate crime. DISHONEST solicitors and legal advisers are
plundering the wills of elderly people and swindling the rightful
beneficiaries. The Royal National Institute for the Blind (RNIB), which has
been a victim of probate fraud, estimates that it costs £150m a year. |
Times Online
Further
reading - TACT
Further reading - Guardian |
25 Jul |
Legal aid: £6m boost but MPs fear
crisis
The civil legal aid system is on
the rocks because solicitors are being unfairly ‘punished’ by draconian
audits and low rates of pay, the parliamentary constitutional affairs select
committee warned last week. |
Law Society Gazette |
23 Jul |
Warning on civil legal aid
restriction
Plans to restrict civil legal aid
could block access to justice for victims of clinical negligence or police
mistreatment, the Law Society warned yesterday. |
Financial Times |
23 Jul |
Net can be profitable - for the
lawyers
IN the old days, when the
internet was just crawling off the drawing board, I was told in no uncertain
terms by a newspaper firm's MD that nobody would ever make money publishing
online. |
IC Wales |
21 Jul |
When does a quick sale become
a crime?
If you have just sold a house and
not been asked for a passport and other identification, then your agent was
breaking the law. |
Independent |
21 Jul |
Ex-Versailles man must pay
£14.2m Fred Clough, the former
finance director of the collapsed Versailles trade finance group, has been
ordered to pay £14.2m by way of confiscation, following his admissions of
fraud at the Versailles businesses and at a company called Normandy Ltd. The
order was made at Southwark crown court yesterday, |
Financial Times |
21 Jul |
New head to transform Law Society |
The Lawyer |
20 Jul |
Law Soc says yes to conflict
rules
Under a refined definition of
what constitutes a conflict of interest, solicitors and firms will be
prevented from acting where duties to the best interests of clients
conflict, or where “there is a significant risk that those duties may
conflict”. (Check out
Royal Charter,
while you're browsing. UJ) |
The Lawyer |
19 Jul |
Revenue tightens rules on
stamp duty
Thousands of homebuyers who fail
to correctly file their stamp duty returns on time face an Inland Revenue
clampdown from today. |
Telegraph |
19 Jul |
Work till you're 70, says CBI
The Confederation of British
Industry will today call for a £20 a week increase in the basic state
pension paid for by a rise in the retirement age to 70 years old for men and
women.(So whom, precisely, should we trust with our pensions and
savings in this fraud-blighted country? UJ) |
Guardian |
19 Jul |
SFO loses half its cases
The Serious Fraud Office has
suffered one of its worst-performing years on record, securing convictions
against only half of suspected fraudsters brought to court and tried,
according to its annual report published today. |
Guardian |
19 Jul |
Lose the savings habit and
beware a pensions disaster
...Apologists for the FSA thus
argue that the need for a powerful regulatory authority has never been
greater. Public confidence has been undermined by a series of industry
failures - pension mis-selling, the Equitable Life disaster, endowment
policy shortfalls and then the split capital trust debacle in which fund
managers, trading on their sophistication and professionalism, developed a
product that proceeded to lose £900 million of investors’ money. |
The Scotsman |
19 Jul |
Penny-Stock Lawyer Nears Day
of Reckoning
There have been so many big-time
white-collar-crime trials going on at the federal courthouse in Manhattan
this summer that nobody has paid much attention to the case of Washington
lawyer Thomas T. Prousalis Jr. |
Washington Post |
19 Jul |
SEC Says No Comment to
Investigation of Berlin Exchange, Says Reuters
"Every time a government has tried to crack down on this type
of thing in one location, it tends to migrate offshore where it's obviously
much harder to regulate," Reuters quoted Lynn Stout, a professor of
securities regulation at the University of California, Los Angeles. |
Investor's Business Daily |
19 Jul |
Blair's crackdown on thugs
marks end of liberal consensus
"People do not want to return to
old prejudices and to ugly discrimination. But they do want rules . . .
proper behaviour . . . where those who play by the rules are those who don't
get punished," he is expected to say. |
Financial Times |
19 Jul |
Bank starts defence against
£850m claim in BCCI affair
The Bank of England will today
start to outline its defence against the ground-breaking £850m "misfeasance"
claim, which has put the central monetary authority in the dock for the
first time in its 300-year history. |
Financial Times |
19 Jul |
SEC Hedge Fund Proposal
Doesn't Go Far Enough To more
effectively police the burgeoning $850 billion industry -- which is
projected to manage $2 trillion within three years -- the undermanned SEC
will need to join forces with states and require transparent return
reporting standards. Such regulatory teamwork may even provide more
protection against fraud for investors. |
Bloomberg |
19 Jul |
FSA to trim investigation times
FSA chairman Callum McCarthy said that "the critical thing about enforcement
is speed", adding that "justice delayed is justice denied". |
BBC |
18 Jul |
Phishers face more jail time
US President Bush this week signed into law a bill that stiffens criminal
penalties for identity thieves, including those who purloin information
electronically using phishing attacks. |
IT
News Australia |
16 Jul |
Support for renewed ban on
referral fees gathers momentum
Solicitors at the Law Society AGM this afternoon voted against the Council
in favour of a motion proposing a renewed ban on referral fees. |
The Lawyer |
16 Jul |
Vulnerable people excluded
from legal aid, MPs warn
The rocketing costs of legal
aid for criminal and asylum cases are threatening the survival of the civil
aid scheme which helps the poor and vulnerable with debt, housing, family
and other legal problems, a committee of MPs said yesterday. |
Guardian |
16 Jul |
Carreker signs two UK banks to
fraud detection technology
15 July 2004 - Carreker
Corporation (Nasdaq: CANI), a leading provider of technology and consulting
solutions for the financial industry, today announced that two of the
leading banks in the UK and Ireland have licensed Carreker's fraud detection
solutions, FraudLink On-Us(TM) and FraudLink PC(TM). (Why are solicitors so
slow to embrace this technology? UJ) |
Finextra |
15 Jul |
Credit rating service goes
online
An internet service has been
launched to let people check their credit rating. For a £11.75 fee the
encrypted service from Equifax, one of the UK's two major credit reference
agencies, will outline an individual's credit history. |
BBC |
15 Jul |
Gov.uk launches anti-fraud
website
The government
has announced a new online "one-stop shop" to help prevent ID fraud. |
The
Register
identity-theft.org.uk |
15 Jul |
Criminals cash in on personal
details
An industry based on personal
information obtained by deception and bribery has sprung up, the data
protection watchdog has warned. Investigators directed by the information
commissioner have found "particular problems" with "blagging" in police
forces, the Inland Revenue, the Department for Work and Pensions and the
Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency. |
Financial Times |
15 Jul |
Judges and MPs escape pensions
tax
Ministers are set to allow senior
civil servants, judges and MPs to escape new pension rules which could save
highly paid public officials thousands of pounds in tax surcharges. |
Guardian |
15 Jul |
Law Society clears conflict rule
reforms
The Law Society’s decision-making
council has approved changes to the conflict of interest rules banning firms
from acting on both sides of a deal. |
Legal Week |
15 Jul |
Convicted porn judge to keeps
his pension
LONDON - A Crown court judge
caught by an American investigation into child pornography on the internet
escaped a prison sentence yesterday after admitting downloading indecent
images of young boys. |
New Zealand Herald |
15 Jul |
Management- Professional
Indemnity: Lifting the burden
With the risk management
differential between various elements of the legal services sector wider
than ever, is now the time for the debate on the minimum terms and
conditions of solicitors’ PI cover to begin in earnest? Dave Coughlan
reports |
Legal Week |
15 Jul |
A step forward
City firms are coming under
increasing attack for failing to encourage lawyers from ethnic minority
groups — are clients the key to pushing a sea change forward? Mary Mullally
reports |
Legal Director |
15 Jul |
Chancery Lane consultants bill
rockets 50%
The increase in spending on
external consultants comes despite a 33% rise in staffing costs, up from
£30.6m in 2002 to £40.8m. The rise includes a 17% increase in staff numbers,
primarily to handle an expanded complaints-handling team at the Office for
the Supervision of Solicitors. |
Legal Week |
15 Jul |
Financier 'misled City law
firm over his contract'
Scottish financier Ken Murray was
accused of "trying to mislead" Lovells, the City law firm, over the nature
of his contract with his former company Murray Financial Corporation in the
High Court yesterday. |
Telegraph |
14 Jul |
E-mails evolve into hard
evidence
They might be intended as just a
bit of fun but employers are unlikely to see the joke when bad taste e-mails
sent by members of staff lead to costly payouts. |
Financial Times |
14 Jul |
SEC Seeks to Clamp Oversight
on Hedge Funds
Federal regulators are proposing
to clamp new oversight on hedge funds, traditionally investment pools for
the wealthy that are growing and largely unregulated. |
The Ledger |
14 Jul |
Microsoft issues seven
security bulletins
Fixes from Microsoft, read more
on The Gazette. |
Microsoft
The Gazette |
14 Jul 2004 |
Peers reject bid to axe office
of Lord Chancellor.
Long overdue constitutional
reforms falter as lords favour retaining centuries-old rituals and
traditions.
"...an uncontrollable obsession
with obliterating the past". Tory hereditary peers accused ministers of
behaving like "Boadicea in her chariot". The costume ball goes on.
Solicitors must be terribly confused: "Hang on - if we are already Officers
of the Supreme Court, why do we need another one?" Interesting question. |
Guardian
The Times
Telegraph
The Scotsman
BBC |
14 Jul |
Judge spared jail sentence
over child porn on computer
A Crown Court judge caught by an
American investigation into child pornography on the internet escaped a
prison sentence yesterday after admitting downloading indecent images of
young boys.
David Selwood, who retired from the bench on grounds of ill-health shortly
before he was formally charged, was given a 12-month community
rehabilitation sentence and will keep his £33,000-a-year pension. (Updates:Jan
2007) |
Independent |
14 Jul |
Equitable policyholders take
mis-selling claim to court
A 700-strong group of Equitable
Life policyholders are today due to issue a multimillion pound writ against
the insurer, claiming they were victims of mis-selling. |
Guardian |
14 Jul |
Do you need to apply for FSA
authorisation by 13 July 2004? A surprising range of businesses do.
Consumer insurance products have
become a lucrative source of income for service providers and retailers with
customers now able to purchase insurance from supermarkets, travel agents,
motor dealers and other High Street retailers. |
Mondaq |
12 Jul |
Europe's anti-fraud office
accused of abusing its power
Leaked documents on the arrest of
a fraud-busting journalist have intensified fears that the European Union is
abusing its growing investigative powers to manipulate evidence and silence
criticism. |
Telegraph |
12 Jul |
'Magic circle' performances
eclipsed by mid-sized firms
The financial performance of the
biggest law firms has been eclipsed by many medium-sized solicitors,
according to new results published today. |
Financial Times |
12 Jul |
Corporate lawyers
couldwinQCstatus under reform plan
Corporate solicitors could soon
be awarded the rank of Queen's Counsel under plans to widen a new "quality
mark" scheme beyond courtroom advocates, the outgoing president of the Law
Society has indicated. |
Financial Times |
12 Jul |
Midland lawyer in mob probe
A Midland lawyer is at the centre
of a major police investigation into organised crime. |
IC Birmingham |
11 Jul |
How law shelters mis-selling
solicitors
Homeowners who bought endowment
policies from solicitors are being penalised when it comes to claiming
compensation for mis-selling, it emerged last week. |
The Sunday Herald |
11 Jul |
Interesting takes on current legal news |
Roll on Friday |
09 Jul |
Brighton estate agent banned
Brighton estate agent Allan
Langley-Smith has been banned from engaging in estate agency work for life
by the OFT. |
OFT |
08 Jul |
Points to Ponder
The Law Society is a Company
Incorporated By Royal Charter. In view of its lamentable failure to regulate
its members objectively, with whom should the buck stop?
"At least 75% of the corporate members should be qualified to first degree
level standard. Finally, both in the case of charities and professional bodies,
incorporation by Charter should be in the public interest." |
UnjustIS |
08 Jul |
Zurich calls for indemnity
reforms
Insurance giant Zurich is
pressing the Law Society to reform the regime for solicitors’ insurance to
limit the protection handed out to law firms buying compulsory cover. |
Legal Week |
08 Jul |
Diversity in legal profession
growing, say Law Society
New statistics published this
week by the Law Society show that the proportion of practising solicitors
from ethnic minorities now matches that of the national population. |
The Lawyer |
07 Jul |
More complaints to The Law
Society
The Law Society of Scotland has
once again been criticised for inadequacies in its complaints system. In her
annual report published today, Scotland's legal watchdog Linda Costelloe
Baker highlights her concern that the number of complaints to the Law
Society and to the Ombudsman rose by sixty-one percent in the past year.
(download TV news item) |
Grampian TV |
06 Jul |
Law Society under fire for
complaint failures
The Law Society is facing renewed
criticism today over its complaints handling, as a report reveals it has
failed to reach five out of six targets set by the Department of
Constitutional Affairs. |
The Lawyer |
06 Jul |
Companies gain cheaper legal
advice
Companies should benefit from
cheaper legal advice from today after barristers ditched the rule that
prevented clients from engaging them directly. Since the 19th century, with
few exceptions, anyone wishing to employ a barrister had to go through a
solicitor, in effect duplicating legal fees. But now clients will be able to
instruct barristers directly for specialist advice, legal drafting and
courtroom advocacy. |
Financial Times |
06 Jul |
Bar Council triumphs in direct
access win
In an historic move barristers
can now receive instructions direct from members of the public following a
change in the Bar Council’s code of conduct. |
The Lawyer |
06 Jul |
Rap for Society over legal
complaints
SCOTLAND'S top legal watchdog
today slammed the Law Society for failing to investigate complaints against
lawyers. |
Evening Times |
06 Jul |
Law Society could lose power over
solicitors as report condemns failures
The Law Society risks losing its
powers to regulate solicitors as a report out today reveals it has failed to
meet all but one of six government targets for dealing with complaints
against the profession. (download the report from the LSO) |
Guardian
Legal Services
Ombudsman |
06 Jul |
I WAS TRICKED OUT OF £3,000 -
VICTIM
A new variant of the "Advance
fee" fraud continues to dupe the unwary in the UK |
Gloucestershire Echo |
04 Jul |
There's a self-help book for
the scarpering CEOs
"So where would you go if you
were a CEO on the lam? It's kind of a relevant question these days with all
the cracking down on corporate crime going on in America." Richard Siklos -
Telegraph |
Telegraph |
04 Jul |
What's the problem with lawyers?
We all need solicitors at some
stage and they don't come cheap. But the level of client dissatisfaction is
said to be too high and the system for dealing with complaints is deemed
ineffective. Jill Papworth reports on a disturbing survey. |
Guardian
Which? Press Release |
03 Jul |
Setback for plan to axe post of
Lord Chancellor and form supreme court
Government plans for abolishing
the historic post of Lord Chancellor and setting up Britain's first supreme
court suffered a fresh setback yesterday when ministers and peers failed to
reach agreement on the legislation. |
Telegraph |
03 Jul |
Financial adviser who killed
elderly client jailed for life
An independent financial adviser
who fleeced an elderly client out of almost £300,000, then murdered her
after she demanded her money back, was jailed for life yesterday. |
Guardian |
02 Jul |
Judge in parting shot at legal
eagles
THE Supreme Court's
longest-serving judge, Graham Prior, has marked his retirement with a
stinging parting shot at the legal profession, accusing it of "playing
games" rather than seeking justice for its clients. |
The Advertiser (AUS) |
02 Jul |
Phillips and Woolf: scrap the
High Court
The High Court and county courts
could be scrapped to make way for a unified civil court under broad
proposals backed by the Master of the Rolls (MR) and the Lord Chief Justice. |
Lawgazette |
02 Jul |
Selection of judges condemned as
biased
The selection procedure for
appointing senior judges in England and Wales is so biased and outdated
there should be an immediate bar on further appointments, according to the
first independent audit of the system. |
Guardian |
02 Jul |
More stalemate over law
reforms Attempts to break
stalemate between ministers and the House of Lords over plans for sweeping
changes to Britain's legal landscape have failed. |
BBC |
02 Jul |
Campbell blasts judicial
appointments
Judicial appointments
commissioner Sir Colin Campbell has savaged the system for appointing High
Court judges, claiming it is so flawed that judicial appointments must be
suspended until a new process is put in place. |
Legal Week |
01 Jul |
Lawsuit funders head for
Britain
AN AUSTRALIAN investment company,
backed by one of the country’s richest men, is to be the first firm in
Britain to specialise in funding lawsuits brought by dissatisfied litigants
such as shareholders. |
TimesOnline |
01 Jul |
FSA to cut fees after £12m
peak in fines
The Financial Services Authority
said the fines, which included a £2m penalty on Lloyd's TSB for mis-selling
stock market-linked precipice bonds, would go to reducing next year's fees
charged to regulated firms. |
Telegraph |
01 Jul |
Revealed: the huge gap between
the rich and poor
THE north-south divide is
in-creasing, with Glasgow the poorest city in the UK, according to figures
published yesterday. |
The Herald |
01 Jul |
MPs call for stiffer hacking
penalties
The jail sentence for computer
hackers should be raised from six months to two years and the police should
be allowed to extradite criminals who hack into British computer systems
from overseas, a committee of MPs said yesterday. |
Guardian |
01 Jul |
Court to decide on lawyer's
conduct
A BRISBANE law firm principal who
allegedly told clients they were "absolute morons" has been charged with
professional misconduct and may be struck from the roll. The Queensland Law
Society found Michael Vincent Baker, of Baker Johnson Lawyers, should answer
five counts of inappropriate charging of clients and two counts of using
"crude, insulting and offensive language" towards clients. |
The Courier Mail |
01 Jul |