Latest news with #appeal
BBC News
3 hours ago
- Business
- BBC News
Top lawyer loses appeal against misconduct ruling
A Scottish KC who was found to have acted in a "serious and reprehensible manner" in a legal feud over a dating app business has lost his appeal against a misconduct Smith KC had appealed after the Faculty of Advocates complaints committee found him guilty of three counts of professional misconduct following a complaint by a man involved in a civil dispute with two former business disciplinary tribunal of the Faculty allowed the appeal on one count, but upheld the remaining two, concluding they were "sufficiently serious on their own" to justify the conclusion that Mr Smith's actions amounted to professional Elliott had complained about Mr Smith's conduct during a protracted legal feud over two dating apps, Bender and Brenda. Mr Elliott had planned to launch the apps with two friends, Steven Worley and Kevin Farrell, in 2011. The trio fell out and Mr Elliott tried to launch the business on his own. This led to civil litigation starting in 2013 from Mr Worley and Mr Farrell, who were represented by Mr court cases over the control of the business and its IP ensued, the defence of which Mr Elliot says cost him hundreds of thousands of pounds. He was declared bankrupt in one, but in another, a judge ruled that he had been entitled to set the business up on his Elliott first complained about Mr Smith's conduct in the cases in 2018. He claimed Mr Smith had become personally involved in the business affairs of his clients, contrary to the advocates' rule book, the Guide to the Professional Conduct of year, the Faculty complaints committee agreed and found Mr Smith guilty on three counts and said he had failed to adhere to an advocate's "fundamental obligations" and to "maintain independence".Mr Smith said he was "astonished" by the finding and appealed. In the new Faculty ruling, the disciplinary tribunal agreed with the complaint committee's finding that Mr Smith should not have accepted the instruction to act for Mr Worley and Mr Farrell between January 2015 and May 2018 because of a close personal involvement with their business tribunal agreed that this breached rules around duty of independence and obligation of tribunal also upheld Mr Elliott's complaint that Mr Smith should not have accepted instruction to appear for Mr Worbey and Mr Farrell in May involved Mr Smith acting for the men despite introducing them to his brother, David Smith. David Smith later secured the trademarks for the dating apps through his tribunal dismissed the committee's findings on the third count, relating to alleged improper contact with Mr Elliott's bankruptcy trustee in May it said the two upheld complaints were "sufficiently serious on their own to justify the conclusion that the member's conduct in relation to these issues amounted to professional misconduct". The tribunal acknowledged the committee did not find Mr Smith had acted dishonestly or in bad faith. Rather, the issue had been around a lack of understanding around professional it said the Guide to the Professional Conduct of Advocates attached "considerable importance to the requirement for an advocate to have absolute independence, free from all other influence, especially such as may arise from his personal interests" and said the complaints committee was entitled to conclude Mr Smith's conduct "amounted to professional misconduct".Mr Smith had previously been handed a severe written censure. The tribunal said this sanction would stand because the committee had made no errors in finding breaches to the code on two BBC has tried to contact Mr Smith for comment but he has not been Elliott, the complainer, told the BBC he felt "vindicated" but that the process should not have taken seven years."I should not have had to endure a complaints process so exhausting, intimidating, obstructive, and expensive - a process clearly designed to make people give up," he said the system needed reform and that he hoped his case would encourage other people to speak up "even when the odds are stacked against them".
CBS News
3 hours ago
- Politics
- CBS News
No bond for former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters as backers go to federal court
Lawyers for convicted former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters on Tuesday tried to get a federal court in Denver to let her out on bond as they appeal her case in the Colorado State Court of Appeals. But the magistrate judge in federal court said he was not finding any reason to do so. "You're saying put her on bond, and I don't know that there's anything that authorizes that," said US Chief Magistrate Judge Scott T. Varholak. Peters is in jail in Larimer County as she serves nine years on a variety of convictions for her role in orchestrating a breach of unauthorized areas of Mesa County's elections office. She was convicted last August of three counts of attempted to influence a public servant, conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, violation of duty, and failing to comply with the Colorado Secretary of State. Attorneys for Peters, who was not brought in for the hearing, are trying to involve federal courts in the review of her state-level convictions. "If there's ever a case in which somebody should be released from jail, it's this one," said attorney Peter Ticktin. Ticktin, a Florida-based attorney and longtime friend of President Donald Trump, said he was willing to drop several claims the magistrate judge said were not yet handled by the State Court of Appeals and should be. The petitioners are still hoping to claim in federal court that Peters' sentencing in a state court was a violation of her 1st Amendment rights because they claim the judge at her trial factored in the potential that not putting Peters in jail would allow her to speak publicly about the election security. But Varholak said the appeals to Colorado's State Court of Appeals is the place to make that case, and until those appeals are exhausted, he did not want to weigh in. "If Habeas is available, you have to present it to the Colorado Court of Appeals," he said, referring to the petitioner's efforts to have the court exercise habeas corpus, which means the federal court would have to demonstrate a legal basis for detaining her. That would hold the possibility of allowing her out of jail on bond during the appeals process. Varholek said he could find no example in the history of the United States in which that has been done before appeals were exhausted at the state level. He gave Peters' attorneys three weeks to file a brief on the issue. Peters did not attend the hearing. She remains in the custody of the Larimer County Sheriff. Outside the court, Ticktin railed against Peters' conviction and sentence. "Why would she possibly be remorseful for doing exactly what her duty was to do? She never did anything wrong. Why are they so afraid of her having free speech? It's because she's not speaking lies, it's because she's speaking the truth." While Peters appeals her conviction and sentence, the Department of Justice says it is reviewing the case. "This review will include an evaluation of the State of Colorado's prosecution of Ms. Peters and, in particular, whether the case was "oriented more toward inflicting political pain than toward pursuing actual justice or legitimate governmental objectives," said a release from earlier this year. The Colorado Attorney General's Office has characterized the move as unprecedented.
Wall Street Journal
7 hours ago
- Business
- Wall Street Journal
Tom Hayes, Libor ‘Ringleader,' Wins U.K. Appeal to Clear His Name
Tom Hayes, the former trader who became the face of the Libor scandal, won a last-ditch appeal to clear his name, undoing one of the most high-profile cases to emerge from the global financial crisis. The U.K. Supreme Court on Wednesday quashed the landmark 2015 conviction, which saw Hayes spend more than five years in prison before he was released in 2021.
ABC News
8 hours ago
- ABC News
Court date set for High Country killer Greg Lynn to fight for appeal
A date has been set for the next step in High Country killer Greg Lynn's push to overturn his murder conviction. A jury last year found Lynn, 58, guilty of Carol Clay's murder but acquitted him of murdering Russell Hill in Victoria's High Country in March 2020. On Wednesday, a court heard the date for the former Jetstar pilot's application for leave to appeal — where it will be decided whether Lynn's appeal against his conviction can proceed — had been set for October 31. Lynn was sentenced to 32 years' jail last year over Ms Clay's murder. Ms Clay, 73, was shot in a struggle that that also claimed the life of her lover, Mr Hill, 74. During his trial, the prosecution argued Lynn's "disproportionate" actions to contaminate the crime scene and dispose of the bodies was incriminating conduct that pointed to murder. However, Lynn's lawyers described a scenario of two tragic, accidental killings. The pair were last seen alive during their camping trip in the Wonnangatta Valley, about five hours east of Melbourne, in March 2020. The trial heard Lynn crossed paths with the retired campers, where an argument over his hunting activities, loud music and Mr Hill's drone escalated into struggles over a gun and a knife. Lynn claimed Mr Hill stole his shotgun, and the two men had wrestled over it, and that Ms Clay was shot in the head when the weapon discharged. He said Mr Hill was also accidentally killed during a subsequent tussle over a knife. Lynn was the only survivor and there were no witnesses. During his trial, Lynn claimed he torched Ms Clay and Mr Hill's campsite fearing nobody would believe the deaths were accidental. He admitted to transporting the pair's bodies and dumping them near the remote Union Spur Track, where he later returned to incinerate them. Lynn was taken into custody in late 2021, and soon afterwards, Mr Hill and Ms Clay's remains were found. During sentencing remarks, Justice Michael Croucher called Ms Clay's death "a very grave example of murder". But he also said there were elements of the case that remained unclear, including exactly what unfolded during the deadly fight at Bucks Camp, whether Lynn had a motive, and the order in which the campers died. "I am satisfied Mrs Clay was killed instantly when she was shot to the head with Mr Lynn's shotgun," the judge said. "It is a grave crime to extinguish the life of another violently." Lynn pleaded not guilty during the trial and has maintained his innocence, formally lodging his appeal of the verdict in November. According to court documents released by the Supreme Court of Victoria, Lynn's lawyers have appealed based on four grounds, including the argument "a substantial miscarriage of justice" happened due to the jury's decision making. If his appeal is unsuccessful, Lynn will have to serve at least 24 years behind bars before he is eligible for parole.
Irish Times
a day ago
- Irish Times
Man who claimed partner deliberately stabbed herself fails in appeal
A man convicted of manslaughter, who claimed that his partner deliberately stabbed herself to death, has failed in a bid to have his 12-and-a-half-year sentence reduced on appeal. Martin Hayes (36) was found not guilty of Amadea McDermott's (27) murder, but guilty of her manslaughter by the majority verdict of a Central Criminal Court jury in November 2023. Hayes, with an address at Poddle Close, Crumlin, Dublin 12, had pleaded not guilty to murdering the mother of two at her home in Rathvale Drive, Ayrfield, Coolock, on or about July 20th, 2017. He told the trial that his partner inflicted the injury on herself. Hayes had admitted using violence against Ms McDermott in his own evidence to the trial. READ MORE Mr Justice Paul McDermott sentenced him to 12 years and six months in November 2023. Speaking following Haye's conviction in 2023, Eucharia McDermott described her sister's killer as a 'deranged monster'. Hayes appealed his sentence, arguing that the judge gave excessive weight to the aggravating factors in the case, specifically in setting a headline sentence of 14 years. James Dwyer SC, defence counsel for Hayes, also argued that inadequate weight was given to the mitigating factors in the case resulting in a final sentence that was 'higher than it should have been'. In dismissing the appeal on Tuesday, Mr Justice Patrick McCarthy said there were limited mitigating factors in this case. He said the judge rightly placed the offence in the category attracting a headline sentence of between ten and 15 years. The offence was aggravated by domestic violence, he said, noting there had been evidence of 'fresh violence' to the face of the deceased, which it was accepted occurred on the night of the killing as well as older bruises indicating previous violence. Mr Justice McCarthy said there was also evidence of 'an unhealthy, extreme and unfounded' view of purported impropriety of a sexual nature which indicated a 'very significant form of coercive control'. He also noted the circumstances of the appeal were 'slightly out of the ordinary' in that it had been contended that the judge fell into error in the decision he made as to the factual circumstances for the basis of manslaughter. Dismissing this ground of appeal, he said the trial judge approached the matter in a rational way upon the evidence and adopted what might be described as 'the rational, obvious and clear view' of what happened. Imposing sentence in November 2023, Mr Justice Paul McDermott said the killing was clearly a case of domestic violence and he noted that during her life, Hayes had tracked Ms McDermott's movements using a secret app on her phone. The judge further noted the recent bruises on Ms McDermott's body as recorded by a pathologist following her death and evidence that Hayes had a history of aggressive and violent behaviour towards his victim. In 2023, Amadea McDermott's sister, Eucharia, said that Hayes had told 'lie after lie without a shred of evidence' in his testimony to the trial when he falsely alleged that Ms McDermott had caused her own death by stabbing herself. She thanked gardaí and the prosecution team who had, she said, 'helped to convict this violent, sick, evil, twisted, deranged monster.'
