A top lawyer has been cleared of professional misconduct over complaints he acted improperly during a legal feud over a dating app.

Andrew Smith KC was censured by the Faculty of Advocates complaints committee in 2024.

He failed in his first bid to overturn the decision, but the case was considered again by the faculty's disciplinary tribunal following a ruling by a judge at the Court of Session earlier this year.

The tribunal has now set aside the complaints committee's original decision and dismissed the complaint against Smith.

The disciplinary tribunal was chaired by Lord Drummond-Young, a retired Senator of the College of Justice.

The original ruling came during a protracted legal feud over two dating apps, Bender and Brenda.

The complainant, Steven Elliott, had planned to launch the apps with two friends, Steven Worley and Kevin Farrell, in 2011. The three men fell out and Elliott tried to launch the business on his own.

This led to civil litigation starting in 2013 from Worley and Farrell, who were represented by Smith. Several court cases followed over the control of the business and its intellectual property.

Elliott first complained about Smith's conduct in the cases in 2018.

He claimed Smith had become personally involved in the business affairs of his clients, contrary to the advocates' rule book, the Guide to the Professional Conduct of Advocates.

The Faculty of Advocates complaints committee found Smith guilty in 2024 and said he had failed to adhere to an advocate's "fundamental obligations" and to maintain his "independence".

Smith appealed against the decision and last year a disciplinary tribunal upheld two of the three findings of professional misconduct.

Smith then raised an action in the Court of Session, where his lawyers argued that he had not become personally involved in his clients' business affairs.

They said he was acting as their advocate, not as a participant in the business, and that there was no clearly identified conflict of interest.

In June, Lord Colbeck quashed the decision of the tribunal at the Court of Session.

He concluded that the decision could not stand because the disciplinary bodies had failed to give adequate reasons for rejecting an earlier finding that Smith had been acting as counsel rather than becoming personally involved in his clients' business affairs.

Following that ruling, the appeal was considered afresh by the disciplinary tribunal.

In an update posted on its website, the Faculty of Advocates said the tribunal had now set aside the earlier decision of the complaints committee and dismissed the compliant in its entirety.

The full written decision will be published later.

Smith said he was pleased to have been "vindicated" and that he hoped lessons had been learned.

"It is unfortunate that this process has taken so long to reach a conclusion that my conduct was entirely proper," he said.

"It is surprising that the complaints committee could have made a decision that was so utterly lacking in reasoning that it was overturned without hesitation, especially so when that committee had two senior members of faculty making the decision."

Elliot declined to comment on the ruling.

A spokesperson for the Faculty of Advocates said all complaints about its members were taken seriously and treated fairly.

"Robust procedures are in place, including the opportunity for oversight by the court.

"Some complaints take more time than others to examine and consider. This was certainly such a case. The matter is now at an end."