Dishonesty over £45k client funds and account failures led to solicitor Rajesh Babajee being struck off
A solicitor who misappropriated client money, failed to maintain accounts and continued practising when he was not entitled has been struck off the Roll.
The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT) found that Rajesh Babajee, admitted in 2006 and formerly practising as Benn Cameron Solicitors and later Lambeth Solicitors, engaged in serious misconduct amounting to dishonesty. He did not attend the hearing and took no part in the proceedings.
The tribunal heard that in late 2009 Babajee handled the sale of a property in London after his first firm had closed. He received £155,000 in sale proceeds but failed to safeguard the funds. While £110,000 was eventually paid to his client, the remainder—about £45,000—was misused. Bank records showed dozens of cash withdrawals and card payments, including to supermarkets and high street shops, which Babajee admitted were for his personal use. He also claimed legal fees of £28,000 for the conveyance, but had never issued a bill and could not justify the figure.
The tribunal found that Babajee had acted dishonestly by using client money for personal benefit and releasing funds when he knew that no transfer deed had been delivered to the purchaser’s solicitors. His conduct, the panel concluded, fell far below the standards expected of the profession.
Investigators from the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) also found serious breaches of the accounts rules. Babajee operated office and client money through ordinary business accounts, failed to open or maintain a proper client account, and did not pay sale proceeds into the correct type of account. A shortage of £144,000 remained unrectified for over a year.
Embed from Getty ImagesBabajee was further found to have failed to safeguard records and documents of his practice. Files were abandoned at a serviced office in Ilford, which later disposed of them after he left without notice. This prevented him from producing documents requested by the regulator and left clients exposed.
The tribunal also heard that after leaving Lambeth Solicitors in July 2012, Babajee continued to represent a client in litigation under the guise of still being with the firm. He issued invoices in his own name, signed court documents as a solicitor, and used his home address as a base, despite no longer being entitled to practise as a sole practitioner. The SDT said this demonstrated a lack of integrity and deliberate misrepresentation.
Other allegations included failing to submit accountants’ reports on time, obstructing his former partners’ attempts to regularise matters, and failing to deliver an executed transfer deed in a property sale. The tribunal dismissed some lesser charges, including inadequate supervision of an employee later convicted of unrelated immigration offences, but upheld the most serious claims.
Dishonesty was proved in relation to the misappropriation of client funds, which the panel said represented the most grave breach of trust. It described the case as a “catalogue of failures amounting to a masterclass in how not to run a legal practice”.
Babajee, believed to be living in Mauritius and working as a law lecturer, avoided engagement with the regulator. The SRA resorted to serving notice of the proceedings via adverts in The Times, the Law Society Gazette and a Mauritian newspaper. The tribunal noted that his absence was no bar to proceeding and said his refusal to co-operate compounded the seriousness of his misconduct.
Ordering that he be struck off, the panel stressed that public confidence in solicitors depends on scrupulous honesty and safeguarding of client money. It ruled that nothing less than erasure from the Roll would protect the public and maintain the profession’s reputation.
Babajee was also ordered to pay costs of £34,767.84, reflecting the expense of tracing him and investigating the matter. Whether those costs can be enforced remains uncertain, but the tribunal said the SRA should be given the chance to recover them.
The ruling, dated 9 May 2016, leaves Babajee permanently excluded from practice in England and Wales.