Known conman gets certificate

The Law Society issued a practising certificate to a young lawyer just days after three prominent firms informed it he was a devious conman who had lied about his legal qualifications, it has been claimed.

Jeffrey Doss-Lindsey was admitted as a solicitor on 3 April 1995 after he had duped Slaughter and May, White & Case and Allison & Humphreys into thinking he had, among other accomplishments, gained a first class Oxford degree and been admitted to the Californian Bar.

Doss-Lindsey's trail of deception began unravelling after Allison & Humphreys began investigating his past, after it fired him on 8 February 1995.

It found he had effectively been thrown out of the other two firms for ineptitude, had invented his qualifications, forged the signature of a dying man on a practising certificate and lied about his wife dying.

Allisons compiled a report outlining his deceptions with the help of Slaughters and White & Case, and presented it to the Law Society early in March 1995. But the findings of a Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal last month show that in April of that year the society admitted Doss-Lindsey as a solicitor.

The tribunal struck Doss-Lindsey off the roll, stating he was a dangerous individual who should not have been allowed to practise as a solicitor.

The Law Society would not comment or confirm whether it had received the report on Doss-Lindsey until it had examined the tribunal's findings.

Senior partner at Allisons, Charles Humphreys, called on the society to improve its vetting procedures.



See page 13.