Associate accused of 'gross misconduct' sues Trowers for disability discrimination

_{Excitement in Exeter.}

An associate with ADHD and autism has claimed that Trowers & Hamlins unfairly dismissed her and subjected her to disability discrimination.

‘J’ is suing the firm for constructive unfair dismissal, discrimination on the grounds of disability, a failure to make reasonable adjustments, disability related harassment, victimisation, and unlawful deductions from wages.

J joined the Exeter office of Trowers as a solicitor in 2022.

Trowers initially sought to challenge J’s claim that she was disabled, but at a preliminary hearing last year it conceded that she was.

In a judgment dealing with requests to amend her claim, Employment Judge Danvers permitted J to add an allegation that Trowers took responses she gave in meetings about her conduct and used them against her in its "alleged performance and (mis)conduct processes”, when she didn’t appreciate at the time that the meetings “were supposed to be formal”.

The meetings were called to address J’s "work performance and her (alleged) acts of gross misconduct” which related to “time recording issues” in August and September 2023.

J’s ADHD, autism and long-term anxiety meant that she “found these meetings distressing when she did not know what was going to be discussed in each meeting”, and she “found it difficult to articulate herself well”, according to her claim.

J also sought to amend her claim to state that, by reporting her to the SRA, Trowers had victimised and committed disability discrimination against her.

But the judge rejected that request and her barrister's attempt to draw a distinction between typical reports to the SRA and Trowers' report on J, which the firm submitted in a non-standard way out of a consideration for her mental health.

“We are sending to you a report concerning an individual who we suspect may have acted in breach of the honesty provisions”, Trowers told the SRA.

“We are sending this report to you, rather than through the reporting e-mail, as the individual is fairly vulnerable and we want to do all that we can to protect their mental health and wellbeing… We have left the report anonymous, however, to try to protect them”, it stated.

The judge agreed with Trowers that reporting J to the SRA was covered by the principle of immunity for judicial proceedings.

A spokesperson for Trowers & Hamlins said, “Given the proceedings are ongoing, we are unable to comment”.

[Note: this article was updated on 1/7/25 to anonymise J after Judge Danvers granted her an anonymity order which was sent to the parties on 30/6/25.]

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Comments

Standard operating procedure amongst this generation.

You’re now seeing it in schools too, with every last middle class family hunting around for a SEND diagnosis for their children. Equality weaponised.

Thank goodness the judge rejected the idea that ADHD means you can’t work out whether a meeting is formal or not.

After all, it would have led to clients asking not to have lawyers with ADHD representing them in disputes.

Another influencer allegedly falling foul of the rules

From someone who worked there - what this article doesn’t say is that the real basis of the claim relates to refuting allegations of dishonest time-recording made against a junior lawyer

The allegations are refuted because the time recording system we had was a pile of shit and lots of people were basically told to work around the system when recording their time.

The way that “non-accurate time recording” has been weaponised by senior people at Trowers to target a junior lawyer for whatever reason is bloody awful - especially given that recent SRA/SDT cases have set precedents that inaccurate time recording can constitute a striking off offence

If the points about time recording are true it will all come out

https://www.www.rollonfriday.com/discussion/neurodiversity

Anonymous 27 June 25 08:55,

As a parent of a very well deserved SEN diagnosis for my son, I find this kind of off handed thoughtless needling to be ill considered at the very least. Please, do mention this on your practising certificate renewal as evidence of even handed treatment of your clients.....

What a [*****] first comment. You don't have to be some DEI champion. It's about a law firm being malicious over time recording and a fallout.

"We want to do all we can to protect their mental health" by providing you a report which will at best ruin their career, make it impossible for them to find work and cost them 10k in lawyer's fees defending themselves if you merely chose to investigate, and, at worst, if you come down on them, they'll be disbarred from the profession and have to pay tens of thousands in punishment. Because we are aware of how outraged the profession is at the SRA attacking junior lawyers over non issues particularly on time recording and we think we can capitalise on that to our own advantage.

And who would voluntarily work for a Gestapo employer who would report you to the SRA if they decide they don't like the look of you anymore. Most law firms would never do this, especially as a report back at then, would see them utterly fvcked if the SRA ever decided to really look at what the partners were doing. It really is an attempt to sidestep employment law. By the way, you may not like or understand employment law or the Equality Act but it exists, and Towers could be in breach and it does come across as an attempt to sidestep a tribunal.

HR team known to disregard SRA principles

Anonymous 27 June 25 09:03 when this hearing proceeds to full trial this comment will look silly. Many in the Exeter Office, and senior management know that the allegations were reverse engineered.

Admitting to falsifying timesheets (allegedly) and then blaming it on mental health and mental illness....

Tarnishes those of us with such super powers who do not falsify timesheets (allegedly or otherwise)

Anon 10.21, I think you’ve missed the point.

My criticism is of the parents who game the system. Not the parents of children with genuine needs.

Anon 11.54 the article is about somebody being accused of gross misconduct suing for “constructive unfair dismissal, discrimination on the grounds of disability, a failure to make reasonable adjustments, disability related harassment, victimisation, and unlawful deductions from wages”.

As an employment lawyer, you would think if there was no factual basis for the allegations that it was victimisation and Trowers were really duty bound to report her then they would have made a substantive application to get it struck out?! Seems like great tactical lawyering to only argue that the tribunal does not have jurisdicrion and avoid having the actual substance of the allegations looked at.

So is the claim that a Horizon style scandal is brewing with Trowers time keeping system?

Seriously?

@anon 11:54 the duty to report to the SRA isn’t voluntary, a kind of optional shopping of people. It’s a professional duty with a threshold set out in the SRA codes and explained in the guidance. If a firm has a reasonable belief in facts or matters which are capable of amounting to a serious breach, then there is a duty to report.

If they didn’t have that belief and did it as a sham then that itself is likely to be misconduct. Where is your evidence to demonstrate that case please ?

"it would have led to clients asking not to have lawyers with ADHD representing them in disputes"

Could be ok with that...

Oh no! Not another client who has said no ADHD, what rotten luck for me eh? Well look, tell you what chaps, you can all go on ahead and hop into that litigation tench over there like the client wants and start battling the court deadlines, and I'll deliver a bit of support from the back lines clearing up all this advisory stuff on other files over here. How about that for a team effort? See you in the bar when you're done later tonight? Good luck!

It might not be so bad.

The article also doesn't mention, that which everyone in the Exeter Office knows, that this relates to time that had not even been posted yet.

Is the “Gestapo” in anon 11.54’s post the partners of Trowers and Hamlins?

If so, wow. This escalated fast. What a ****.

@Anonymous 27 June 25 12:57

So why didnt they report it in August/September? If you read the judgment that is apparently when the concerns arose.

Seems like however they did not report it until months later.

Why does this crazy stuff only ever happen in the regional officee

What I don't get is if you have these disabilities and long term anxiety why on earth are you trying to do such a stressful job.

Anonymous 27 June 25 12:56 you don't think law firm management use the SRA against junior lawyers to get out of employment claims?

It's their favourite step in the tactical playbook.

Anonymous 27 June 25 12:39

We don't have the details yet. The rest of the case continues.

Maybe, just maybe, given there are other allegations of victimisation still left to be determined, she was accussed of gross misconduct after she raised concerns of direct, indirect discrimination, harassment, unlawful deductions etc...

If they didn’t have that belief and did it as a sham then that itself is likely to be misconduct. Where is your evidence to demonstrate that case please ?

Mate as a litigator I can tell you that loads of people get reported to the SRA for vexatious reasons for trivial or inconsequential slip ups or sometimes even non existent events. No-one gets prosecuted for malicious reporting - it’s a public policy thing (by analogy just think how many vexatious reports the police get vs the vanishingly small number of prosecutions for false allegations/wasting police time). And that’s just general litigation - must also be prevalent in employment disputes with law firms.

Unfortunate how this is weaponised…

Anonymous 27 June 25 13:42

So disabled people can't have ambition?

As a litigatior, the headline I see is "Claimant permitted to plead further allegations in ongoing claim". Plainly the allegations (original and amended) are justiciable and have a real prospect of success; hence permission. I'm less sure about the immunity argument (although I don't practice employment) - if ithe complaint was vexatious, then could that not justiciably constitute harassment? Ultimately, my speculation is the consequence of nuanced judgments being condensed into pithy articles. Publication like this is a lawyer's worst nightmare (or anyone from any regulated profession) and potentially a permanent professional blight. Hopefully for the firm's sake they are vindicated at trial. This article might have forced C into going to trial - if I was advising D, I would be advising against this exposure, both reputationally and tactically. It's a shame that stuff like this is now newsworthy in the profession.

Anonymous 27 June 25 13:45

Agreed. The actual judgment even has a section on malicious reports so wonder if that was argued.

Anonymous 27 June 25 13:42

Having worked with the individual she always appeared to me to be bright, diligent and had high potential.

Her also having anxiety etc does not mean she cannot do the job. In fact, it sometimes proved quite useful as she thought about things I had not considered.

Seems the real story is in the comments?!

Anonymous 27 June 25 18:26

The real story is in the comments and will absolutely come out in the wash in time.

How very kind of TaH to do the tentative, "softly softly", SRA referral. Because a referral to a regulator is something that should only be done with a sense of decorous anonymity (?). Quite how an ostensibly reputable firm allowed this to make RoF should be a matter for the firm's marketing team.

Anonymous 27 June 25 12:15

Maybe wait for the whole case to come out...

Employment lawyer also. Not uncommon for respondents (particularly big companies) to suddenly allege gross misconduct when faced with a discrim claim. This reeks and makes you wonder who is advising

Trowers has got form with the whole 'get them for gross misconduct' strategy. As for the SRA, even more of a shit show than Trowers and that's really saying something...

I also worked there. She had reported them before they reported her.

People in the comments on ROF when there are stories about junior lawyers getting hauled over the coals and reported to regulators by big law firms:

"Why doesn't someone stand up to them?!", "They always go after low hanging fruit" etc.

The comment section on ROF when someone actually does it:

"Equality weaponised", "another influencer allegedly falling foul of the rules".

Seems from the above comments that this is another case of law firms weaponising the SRA/SDT to get out of employment law, rather than vice versa. But I guess we will find out in time.

No one seems to get the point that if a firm makes a malicious report to the regulator that isn’t backed up by evidence then it will itself be in breach. Obviously. And no firm with Risk team is going to take that step. That assumes advice was of course taken.

I also worked with [J] at Trowers. She always struck me as a diligent and personable employee. To those of you who are suggesting that [J] somehow made a tactical decision to use a disability as a pretext for bringing a claim, that is simply not the case from my experience. I also understand that Trowers had initially made the decision not to report [J] to the SRA, but then did a U-turn on this when she herself reported them. If that is indeed the case, it is really concerning and it's a real shame to see a promising legal career cut short like this.

Anon 10.29, 30 June

She’s suing for “constructive unfair dismissal, discrimination on the grounds of disability, a failure to make reasonable adjustments, disability related harassment, victimisation, and unlawful deductions from wages”.

That doesn’t look to be just standing her ground. That’s hunting around for anything that can be used.

Dearest readers,

I have reason to believe I have relevant information to share with the claimant about Faulty Trowers.

I also have ADHD and anxiety and in my spare time enjoy The Handmaid’s Tale and calling out the SRA’s bullshit.

Would be great to find you, or one of your supporters, as I’m also a fan of justice.

ROF has my email address.

Lady Whistleblow.

Anonymous 01 July 25 11:56

Having known the individuals involved and observed this sorry situation play out, she was suing them for that BEFORE they reported her. She also reported them before they reported her.

I understand that is why she amended her existing claim to add the victimisation claim regarding the SRA referral as she only found out about it later.

Maybe don't make snap judgments from part of the claim when you don't have the full story?

Anonymous 30 June 25 15:10

The SRA dont touch big law firms. Would need to be a big public outcry for that.

30 June 25 15:10

"No one seems to get the point that if a firm makes a malicious report to the regulator that isn’t backed up by evidence then it will itself be in breach. Obviously. And no firm with Risk team is going to take that step. That assumes advice was of course taken"

Please point me to an SDT case or SRA sanction where a law firm and/or its management have ever been in trouble for making malicious reports?

I am not aware of any as they rely on judicial proceedings immunity to get off scott free.

Unlike other regulators like the GMC etc, the SRA do not even have a policy on dealing with malicious reports.

I know this because I asked them.

That is not what they appear to have argued though. They don't seem to have based their defence on the facts and there is no comment on that. Seems they only argued ET could not hear the complaint on the law of judicial proceedings immunity.

This individual seems to have opened a can of worms.

If even half of this is true then Trowers have a problem.

Most big law firms would never be so stupid to ever let a tribunal touch an employment claim by one of its lawyers. The damage to a firm's brand is up in smoke. They could have handed her 50k to feck off with an agreed reference. If they lose, they'll possibly be down 60-100k, and even if they win, which they wont by the sound of things, their rep is tattered. It gets into the legal press, it goes up on google searches for the firm, and everyone is going to at least suspect them of wrongdoing, if they don't outright believe it. Throwing away dollars to pick up dimes. Such poor judgement.