There was no longer a point to pursuing disciplinary proceedings against a lawyer who had already been struck off the roll for his discourteous, offensive language, a tribunal has determined.
The NSW Law Society was granted leave to withdraw proceedings against George Sideris, a lawyer who was struck off in mid-2025 for his “grossly discourteous, coarse, disrespectful, gratuitously offensive, improperly threatening and wholly unprofessional” behaviour.
Judge Rashelle Seiden SC, deputy president of the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal, said there was “little more” the tribunal could do to exercise its powers under the Uniform Law if the subject of the disciplinary action has already been removed from the roll.
The judge determined the tribunal’s resources would be better served if they were instead “directed to other matters”.
As for general deterrence and the way this may impact on the behaviour of other lawyers, Judge Seiden said the earlier proceedings should sufficiently serve as an “adequate caution”.
“On balance, it is not in the public interest for the proceedings to continue, having regard to the objectives of the Uniform Law,” Seiden said in her recent decision, delivered on the papers.
In the July decision, Chief Justice Andrew Bell, Justice Jeremy Kirk, and acting Judge John Griffiths of the NSW Supreme Court said Sideris’ conduct towards other lawyers was “the very antithesis of the professional courtesy that is required of legal practitioners”.
This conduct included telling the Law Society to “fuck off”, accusing The Salvation Army of wanting to “torture” his mother-in-law, and making baseless allegations about a Mills Oakley solicitor.
“To a large extent, the respondent has made the case for his lack of current and continuing fitness to practice out of his own mouth as the sustained verbal barrage set out at length … makes apparent.
“It is not just the language is consistently coarse, but it also discloses a complete absence of respect for individuals, institutions and the tribunal,” the Supreme Court bench found.
“The extreme lack of courtesy and understanding is matched by a wholesale absence of any self-discipline by the respondent in his professional communications.”
The case: Council of the Law Society of New South Wales v Sideris (No 2) [2025] NSWCATOD 151.
Naomi Neilson is a senior journalist with a focus on court reporting for Lawyers Weekly.
You can email Naomi at:
