Serious Fraud Office and other Professional Agencies Investigations
The team represents and advises individuals prosecuted by the SFO as well as individual and corporate recipients of Section 2 Criminal Justice Act 1987 notices, served by the SFO on behalf of foreign jurisdictions that wish to conduct investigations and interviews of individuals and corporate entities situated in the UK.
The draconian nature of such notices places onerous obligations on the recipient, not least the financial and business ramifications that can potentially flow. Our team’s familiarity with the SFO, and with its working practices, allows us to broker an acceptable framework in which the requirements of the notice can be discharged. Recent work has involved representing major foreign exchange company and a niche London-based accountancy practice that were, respectively, recipients of notices served on behalf of the Polish and Italian authorities. We aim to collate the requested documentation (in whatever format), with the minimum of disruption to business operations and to act as the conduit of any further requests. Where necessary we represent the recipient at interviews conducted, by the foreign investigators, under the auspices of the SFO at its headquarters.
The team has extensive experience in preparing defences to such prosecutions, from initial interview to their conclusion, be it with a trial or a decision not to prosecute.
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