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Former solicitor practising without certificate to be removed from roll
A former barrister with the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Service will be removed from the roll following a finding by the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal that he falsely purported to be a legal practitioner, complete with fake letterheads, to act for a client despite not holding a current practising certificate.
Digital
On legal correspondence complete with a letterhead and a signature block, former solicitor Martin James Doyle emailed an opposing client with a warning and a false court date, despite not holding a practising certificate. This breach has resulted in a professional misconduct finding and a recommendation from the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal (QCAT) that he be removed from the roll.
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Mr Doyle was admitted to practise in Queensland in June 2008 and later was given a conditional practising certificate entitling him to work on the condition that he “may practise as a barrister only as an employee of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Service (ATSILS)”. In June 2018, he applied for a principal level practising certificate but failed to make two important payments to the Law Society.
Despite never receiving this certificate, Mr Doyle acted for a client on a dispute he was having with his stepsibling over a house owned by their parents. In an email to the opposing client, Mr Doyle said the “whole saga can end” if a cheque was made out to his client, “otherwise we haul everyone … before the Supreme Court”.
In this email, Mr Doyle included a court date despite there not being one. QCAT said that these false claims were “plainly designed to put improper pressure [on the opposing client] to have her accede to Mr Doyle’s demands”. The tribunal added that these claims unsurprisingly caused the opposing client some distress.
“His conduct that is criticised while practising without a certificate involved dishonesty, misleading statements, unethical dealings, in some respects actions that displayed at best incompetence and unacceptable threats,” QCAT found.
In submissions, Mr Doyle said that he was assisting a friend in legal difficulties and that there was supposed evidence of “highly suspicious and perhaps fraudulent conduct”, so he felt that he needed to act to “prevent a major injustice”. There was no attempt to show this evidence and, even if there had been, QCAT noted that it “would not excuse Mr Doyle’s conduct, but it would go some way to explain it”.
As for his characterisation of the charges as simply involved conduct assisting a friend in legal trouble, QCAT said it “misses the significant point”. His misconduct came in the correspondence he sent to an opposing client, the false court date and the false declaration of being a legal practitioner to put pressure on her.
“Had he behaved in a courteous, honest and competent way in that six-to-eight-week period when assisting a friend, particularly given the long delay in the prosecution of these charges and its impact on him, then there would be some considerable force in his submission that he has learnt his lesson and an adequate response to the charges would be a reprimand. But that is not the situation,” QCAT found.
Given that there has been a significant delay in the prosecution of these matters that had a “devastating” impact on Mr Doyle and his health, no costs order was made.
