Mr Nicholls was a sole practitioner and operated his practice under the name. Nicholls Law Ltd. The Standards Committee began looking into his trust account operations in February 2024 after receiving a complaint from a client that held money in Mr Nicholls’ trust account about his failure to deal with the money as directed. After inquiring into the complaint, it became clear that Mr Nicholls had made a number of unauthorised withdrawals from the client’s funds and had provided a false statement to conceal this. The Tribunal suspended Mr Nicholls on an interim basis from 17 April 2024 and the Committee continued with its investigation.

On 25 November 2024, the matter was the subject of a penalty hearing. The Tribunal noted that:

· Mr Nicholls made over $700,000 worth of unauthorised transactions in his trust account from November 2017 onwards;

· he provided false statements to clients to conceal his wrongdoing through to February 2024; and

· he accepted that he will be struck off.

The Tribunal also noted that, to date, the Fidelity Fund has received nine claims. Six claims, totalling $400,000 have been paid out. The three additional claims total $224,000.

Mr Nicholls attended the hearing but did not explain where the money went. In the absence of any concrete evidence otherwise, the Tribunal found the overwhelming inference must be that Mr Nicholls benefitted personally from the funds. Mr Nicholls expressed sorrow for the inconvenience caused by his actions, but the Tribunal held this was not convincing in the absence of any useful information about the defalcation and noted that he sought to distance himself from his actions in the affidavit filed.

In determining penalty, the Tribunal held there was no appropriate response short of strike-off. It noted “the amount of his defalcation (over $700,000), the repeated breaches of his fiduciary duties, the duration (several years) of his wrongdoing, his falsifications to conceal his wrongdoing, and his ongoing lack of engagement with the Law Society processes: all lead to only one outcome.” The Tribunal also noted that Mr Nicholls had five previous findings for unsatisfactory conduct. Mr Nicholls was therefore struck off the roll of barristers and solicitors and ordered to pay costs.

If you were a client of Mr Nicholls and would like to speak to someone about funds held in his trust account, please contact:

· Sara Wilkinson (Professional Standards Officer, Lawyers Complaints Service): sara.wilkinson@lawsociety.org.nz

· Warrick Hickman (Team Leader, Lawyers Complaint Service): warrick.hickman@lawsociety.org.nz