Grenville Royston Young suspended and fined after tribunal upheld SRA allegations
A solicitor has been suspended from practice for 24 months and fined £20,000 after the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT) found he failed to cooperate with Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) investigations and an intervention into his practice.
The SDT heard allegations against Grenville Royston Young, who practised as a sole practitioner at Grenville Young Solicitor and later as a freelance solicitor. The Tribunal found that between November 2019 and April 2023, he failed to cooperate with the SRA’s investigations and also failed to cooperate with the SRA and its agents during and after the regulator’s intervention into his practice.
Mr Young was admitted to the Roll in June 1981. He operated as a Grenville Young Solicitor until 31 March 2020 before registering as a freelance solicitor from 1 April 2020. The firm undertook landlord and tenant, wills, trust and tax planning, family, commercial and residential property work.
According to the judgment, the SRA repeatedly sought information relating to the closure of the firm, including the completion of a Firm Closure Notification Form and details concerning client money, live files and stored documents. The Tribunal found that Mr Young rarely responded to communications and, when he did, failed to provide substantive answers to the regulator’s enquiries.
The judgment noted that the completed closure form, eventually submitted in March 2022, revealed that the firm held £17,864.77 in client money, two live client files, and 50 wills and deeds, while run-off insurance had not been paid for. The SRA ultimately intervened in the practice in April 2023. The Tribunal found that Mr Young failed to cooperate with the intervention and subsequently allowed payments to be made from the firm’s office account despite being informed through the Intervention Notice that money held by the firm should not be used.
In its findings, the Tribunal concluded that Mr Young’s conduct breached Principles 2, 5 and 7 of the SRA Principles and paragraphs 7.3 and 7.4 of the SRA Code of Conduct. It found that his failure to engage with the SRA in properly closing the firm demonstrated a lack of integrity, undermined public trust and confidence in the profession, and failed to act in the best interests of former clients.
When considering a sanction, the Tribunal found that Mr Young had made a conscious decision not to engage with the regulator regarding the closure of the practice and that his conduct was deliberate, repeated and professionally inadequate. The Tribunal determined that neither a reprimand nor a fine alone would adequately reflect the seriousness of the misconduct. It imposed an immediate suspension from practice for 24 months together with a £20,000 fine, and ordered Mr Young to pay costs of £11,940.