Sarah Anne Hemmings struck off for dishonesty over a £2k bequest and client conflicts
A Buckinghamshire solicitor has been struck off the roll after a disciplinary tribunal found she acted dishonestly over a £2,000 bequest from a client’s will and breached multiple professional duties in other matters.
Sarah Anne Hemmings, who had practised as a member at Wilkins Solicitors LLP in Aylesbury, admitted serious professional misconduct including dishonesty, breaches of trust, and conflicts of interest. The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT) ruled that the misconduct was so grave that nothing short of a strike-off could protect the public and preserve confidence in the legal profession.
The case centred on “Client 4”, who left Hemmings a £2,000 legacy in her will. Between January and February 2014, Hemmings failed to advise the client to seek independent legal advice before making such a bequest to her own solicitor. After the client’s death, she requested a cheque for £2,000 from the estate and later arranged for another cheque to be issued payable to National Savings, concealing that the funds were intended for her own account. The tribunal found that Hemmings deliberately sought to hide her benefit from the firm’s other managers.
Embed from Getty ImagesIn April 2016, she sent the cheque with instructions that the funds be held on her behalf, even though she had been told by a senior colleague, Robert Smith, that she was not entitled to the money. The tribunal concluded that her actions were dishonest and in breach of core principles requiring solicitors to act with integrity and maintain public trust.
Further allegations related to her work between 2010 and 2011 for “Client 1”, “Client 2” and “Client 3”. Hemmings accepted instructions despite clear conflicts of interest and went on to disclose confidential information about one client to another. In one instance she informed a client about private matters involving another’s Lasting Power of Attorney. The tribunal said she breached confidentiality and trust.
In May 2011, Hemmings compounded her misconduct by misleading a client in an email, denying contact with another party despite having engaged with them on several occasions. The tribunal found that this was dishonest.
Hemmings, admitted as a solicitor in 1997, resigned from Wilkins Solicitors in April 2016. At the time of the hearing she was employed at Caversham Solicitors in Reading. She did not attend the hearing, which was dealt with on the papers after an agreed outcome was reached with the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA).
The tribunal considered her conduct over a number of years and concluded it went to “the heart of a solicitor’s duties”. It said the level of culpability was at the highest end of the scale and the damage to the profession’s reputation was “very significant”. It found that the breaches were too serious for a reprimand, fine or suspension.
No mitigation was offered, and the tribunal said there were no exceptional circumstances that might justify a lesser sanction. It therefore approved the agreed outcome of striking Hemmings off the roll.
She was also ordered to pay £15,000 towards the SRA’s costs, reduced from more than £27,000 in recognition of the settlement.
The ruling underscores once again the regulator’s uncompromising stance on solicitors who abuse positions of trust for personal gain. The tribunal concluded that Hemmings’s actions—securing a bequest without independent advice, seeking to conceal payments from an estate, breaching confidentiality, and misleading a client—represented multiple failures of integrity. With her name removed from the roll, she can no longer practise as a solicitor in England and Wales