Tauranga lawyer Craig Horsley is suspended for three years after having sex with a young client.

The New Zealand Lawyers and Conveyancers Disciplinary Tribunal today made public the decision to suspend Craig Ronald Horsley from legal practice for a total of three years, from April 4, 2014.

Craig Horsley was found guilty of misconduct on 19 March this year for providing regulated services to a client while in an intimate personal relationship with her.

The tribunal found that his conduct would reasonably be regarded by lawyers of good standing as disgraceful or dishonourable.

It also found that he wilfully, or recklessly, contravened the rule requiring him to be independent and free from compromising influences or loyalties when providing legal services to his client.

He was suspended from practise as a barrister or solicitor for two years for this charge, commencing on the date upon which he voluntarily ceased practice.

He also admitted a charge of misconduct for knowingly making a false statement to the investigating New Zealand Law Society standards committee.

Horsley signed a statement saying he had not had a personal relationship with the client when he knew that to be false. The tribunal suspended Horsley from practice for a period of three years on that charge, to run concurrently with the suspension on the first charge.

The New Zealand Law Society's National Prosecution Manager, Mark Treleaven, says three years is the maximum period of suspension from practice which can be imposed on a lawyer.

'The tribunal found that the acceptance of responsibility by Mr Horsley and mitigating factors were just sufficient to pull the penalty back from strike-off to the maximum period of suspension,” he says.

'It is totally unacceptable for lawyers to enter into intimate personal relationships with a client where this would compromise the independence of the lawyer. Misleading or providing false information to a Law Society investigation is also viewed extremely seriously.”

Horsley, 55, admitted having an affair with a teenage client and to misleading the Law Society about it. He admitted lying to the committee about the relationship and when it began, saying he did not want his wife to suspect the teenager's baby was his.

Information put before the tribunal by the Canterbury Westlands Standards Committee is that a sexual relationship with the then 18-year-old began in June 2010.

The following day she was involved in a motor vehicle accident and charged with careless driving and driving with excess breath alcohol. She called Horsley from the police station and he went to pick her up. He earlier represented her before the Youth Court in 2008, and 2009.

The issue was made public when she approached him one day in Tauranga District Court in August 2010. She abused him in the busy court foyer announcing she was pregnant with his child.

In April 2011 the woman had a baby girl, now in Child Youth and Family custody. Horsley says he is not the father.

A police investigation found the woman was of legal age (16) when the affair began and that there was no evidence of a crime.