Being a back-stabber is not necessarily a bar to becoming a lawyer. It is occasionally said to be an advantage in some law firms. Shooting people in the back, however, is a different matter – even cynics agree that is incompatible with being a good lawyer.

The Law Society of Upper Canada has just heard the case of a man who argued that the fact that he shot someone in the back while high jacking a plane should not prevent him from being a lawyer. He is applying for a licence to practise law.

In 1984, Parminder Singh Saini shot at several people on board an Air India flight carrying 264 people. Twenty minutes into the flight, he put a gun to the head of a flight attendant and fired. The attendant survived but there was a predictable reaction among passengers. Risking the plane’s destruction, and the consequential carnage, Saini then fired several more shots. One of his shots hit a crew member in the back. Other passengers were stabbed by members of Saini’s terrorist squad.

He seized control of the aircraft and forced it to land in Pakistan where everyone was told to say their final prayers as the plane was going to be blown up. Saini was eventually arrested and sentenced to death. His sentenced was then commuted to life imprisonment in Pakistan but he was released after 10 years on condition that he left the country. He did so and gained entry to Canada by lying. Then he qualified as a lawyer.

During his recent ‘fitness to practise’ hearing, Saini engaged his capacity for legal analysis. Referring to his act of terrorism he conceded: “I had no legitimate right to do that”. He went on to explain that he also understood the underlying reason why shooting people on a plane in mid-flight should be avoided: “It’s not legal”. (Clearly, he had done his reading in law school.)

Referring to the mid-air terrorism and shooting people as “a very serious mistake”, Saini’s lawyer told the Law Society tribunal he should be given the right to practise law in Canada. A ruling is expected in the next few months.

Barristers have been convicted of various acts of aggression ranging from biting a policeman to attacking a barber with a fencing sabre. Acts of violence, though, don’t necessarily ruin a legal career. In 1900, an English barrister from Liverpool was on a tram when a man boarded it and jostled a female passenger. The barrister went over and punched the man in the face so hard he sent him flying on to the kerb where he cracked his head and was killed instantly. The barrister fled the scene and left England on a vessel sailing to the Mediterranean. He lived in Malta for a while then, being caught in bed with another man’s wife, smashed a chamber-pot over the husband’s head and fled the scene again. He was never charged for the killing or the assault but went on to have a distinguished career at the Bar as F E Smith and later became Lord Chancellor.

Professor Gary Slapper is Director of the Centre for Law at the Open University. English Law, by Slapper & Kelly, is published by Routledge-Cavendish

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