A solicitor is accountable to his clients for the benefits which he may have derived clandestinely in transactions in which he was professionally engaged.
A solicitor was active in founding a banking company. Before its establishment he entered into a secret arrangement with a stranger, that the, latter should purchase some property eligible for the banking house on a joint speculation. After its establishment the company purchased part of the premises for their banking house, not knowing that their solicitor was interested in it.
Held: The solicitor must account to the company for all the profit made by him by the whole transaction ; but that the stranger was under no such liability.
Sir John Romilly MR said that the solicitor had held on trust for the client both (i) his interest in (and therefore his subsequent share of the proceeds of sale of) the Hall, and (ii) with ‘very considerable hesitation’, his interest in the adjoining land.
Judges:
Sir John Romilly MR
Citations:
[1859] EngR 789, (1859) 27 Beav 273, (1859) 54 ER 107
Links:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Appeal from – Tyrrell v The Bank Of London And Sir J v Shelley And Others HL 27-Feb-1862
A solicitor retained to act for a company in the course of formation secretly arranged to benefit from his prospective client’s anticipated acquisition of a building called the ‘Hall of Commerce’ by obtaining from the owner a 50% beneficial interest . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Legal Professions, Equity
Updated: 11 October 2022; Ref: scu.288141
