High Court dismisses solicitor-turned-barrister's appeal against US$26,000 (£20,000) SDT fine

Key points

Deputy High Court judge Robert Palmer KC dismissed Zeeshan Mian's appeal against a US$26,000 (£20,000) fine, filed over five and a half years late.
Judge Palmer said the delay was "both serious and significant" and that very compelling reasons were needed to extend time, adding: "Here there are none."
The Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal fined Mr Mian US$26,000 (£20,000) in February 2020 for employing a disbarred barrister as a consultant without checking his identity or record.
Mr Mian argued the SRA's certificate conditions had finally determined the complaints, but the judge said they were "incapable of affecting its power" to refer him.
Judge Palmer said evidence disclosed to Mr Mian in 2025 did not establish even an arguable case that the 2018 referral to the SDT was unlawful.

A deputy High Court judge rules that a solicitor-turned-barrister's appeal, filed over five and a half years late, has no compelling reasons to justify the delay.

The High Court has dismissed an appeal by Zeeshan Mian, a solicitor-turned-barrister, against a US$26,000 (£20,000) fine imposed by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT) in 2020. Robert Palmer KC, sitting as a deputy High Court judge, said the delay of over five and a half years in filing the appeal was "both serious and significant" and that there would have to be very compelling reasons to justify extending time. "Here there are none," he said. The SDT fined Mr Mian US$26,000 (£20,000) in February 2020 and imposed conditions on his practising certificate preventing him from being a law firm owner for two years. The report says he had displayed "manifest incompetence" in employing a disbarred barrister as a consultant at his law firm without checking his identity or record, and also allowed his firm's client account to be used as a banking facility. Mr Mian, who represented himself, argued that the SDT had no jurisdiction because the "complaints against him had already been finally determined by the SRA" by imposing the certificate conditions. He justified his application for a time extension on the grounds that certain evidence not before the SDT was disclosed to him between June and August 2025. Judge Palmer said no application for specific disclosure was advanced before the SDT and that between 2021 and 2025 Mr Mian made no efforts to pursue it. He said the documents, assuming them to be admissible, did not establish even an arguable case that the initial referral to the SDT in 2018 was unlawful. The judge said the case was premised upon a misunderstanding of the statutory scheme created by the Solicitors Act 1974, and that the SRA's imposition of conditions on his certificate was "incapable of affecting its power" to refer him to the SDT. Mr Mian was disbarred in 2022, a decision upheld by the High Court. In September 2026 the SDT struck him off, and he has separately appealed.