The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has withdrawn its appeal against the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal’s (SDT’s) summary dismissal of the professional misconduct proceedings it brought against Carter-Ruck Partner Claire Gill in May 2025. By Consent Order sealed on 10 July 2026, it has also agreed to pay Ms Gill’s costs of the appeal.
The proceedings arose out of an investigation commenced by the SRA in May 2020. The SRA’s case was based on a letter of claim sent by Ms Gill in April 2017 on behalf of her clients, OneCoin Limited and Dr Ruja Ignatova (aka ‘the Crypto Queen’), who operated a cryptocurrency business which subsequently collapsed. The letter was alleged to contain an improper threat of litigation on the basis that the litigation, if it had been issued (which it was not),would have been for the alleged improper purpose of sending a “false PR message” to the effect that the clients were “ready and willing to demonstrate to a court that the allegations made about them were untrue”. In a decision announced on 12 December 2025 after a one and half day hearing, and issued in the form of detailed reasons on 22 December 2025, the SDT rejected the SRA’s case in emphatic terms, holding that it was legally flawed, not supported by evidence, and founded on hindsight. It rejected the SRA’s case based on a “false PR message”, on which the SRA’s case depended, as speculative and legally unsustainable.
In a further decision announced on 5 February 2026 the SDT ordered the SRA to pay Ms Gill’s costs of the proceedings incurred from 2 May 2025, which was 3 weeks after it had received detailed representations from Ms Gill setting out the flaws in its case, save for the costs of three interim applications.
The SRA brought its appeal in the Administrative Court pursuant to s.49(1) of the Solicitors Act 1974 and therefore permission to do so was not required.
Justin Rushbrooke KC, instructed by Carter-Ruck, appeared for Ms Gill.
