Keshia
Herbert
Employee
7288024
Decision - Employee-related decision
Outcome: Control of non-qualified staff (Section 43 / Section 99 order)
Outcome date: 10 September 2025
Published date: 16 October 2025
Firm details
Firm or organisation at time of matters giving rise to outcome
Name: Higgs LLP
Address(es): 3 Waterfront Business Park, Brierley Hill, DY5 1LX
Firm ID: 819589
Outcome details
This outcome was reached by SRA decision.
Decision details
Who does this decision relate to?
Ms Keshia Herbert, whose last known address was in Dudley, West Midlands.
A person who is or was involved in a legal practice but is not a solicitor.
Summary of decision
The SRA has put restrictions on where and how Ms Herbert can work in an SRA regulated firm. It was found that:
Ms Herbert, who is not a solicitor, was involved in a legal practice and has occasioned or been a party to an act or default which involved such conduct on her part that it is undesirable for her to be involved in a legal practice in any of the ways described in the order below.
The facts of the case
Ms Herbert is a non-authorised person. At the time of the misconduct, she was employed as a Legal Assistant at Higgs LLP (the firm). The firm is a licensed body.
Ms Herbert was permitted to work from home on 4 and 5 January 2024. It was found that:
- On or around 9 or 10 January 2024, she recorded time for work which she purported to have completed on 4 and 5 January 2024 when she had not undertaken the work on those dates;
- On 11 January and 26 February 2024, she told the firm that she had worked for 7 hours each day and completed the work shown in her time recording entries for 4 and 5 January 2024, on those dates, when she knew she had not;
- On 9 January 2024, she told her supervisor that she had spoken to the firm's IT team about her missing time recording entries that morning when she knew she had not.
Ms Herbert's conduct was found to be dishonest.
Decision on outcome
An order pursuant to section 43(2) of the Solicitors Act 1974 was imposed as Ms Herbert's conduct meant that it was undesirable for her to be involved in a legal practice without the SRA's prior approval. The order pursuant to section 43 was made to take effect 28 days from the date of the letter or email notifying Ms Herbert of this decision.
Ms Herbert was also ordered to pay a proportion of the SRA's costs of £600.
What our Section 43 order means
- no solicitor shall employ or remunerate her in connection with his/her practice as a solicitor;
- no employee of a solicitor shall employ or remunerate her in connection with the solicitor's practice;
- no recognised body shall employ or remunerate her;
- no manager or employee of a recognised body shall employ or remunerate her in connection with the business of that body;
- no recognised body or manager or employee of such a body shall permit her to be a manager of the body; and
- no recognised body or manager or employee of such a body shall permit her to have an interest in the body
except in accordance with the SRA's prior written permission.