Rogue Trader Brought Down By Investigative Accounting
10 Dec 2012The recent jailing of former UBS trader Kweku Adoboli for what the police describe as the UK’s biggest ever fraud, is in part due to the internal investigation launched in the summer of 2011 and headed by a forensic accountant. The accountant began his investigations but had his work cut out, as, having started in […]
Investigative Accounting Aids Insurers Beat Cash For Crash Scams
10 Dec 2012The Insurance Fraud Bureau’s (IFB) statistics from earlier this month reveal that undetected general insurance claims fraud total £2.1bn a year, adding on average £50 to the annual costs individual policyholders face, each year. Following an investigation carried out by Northumbria Police, with the help of the IFB’s highly-sophisticated counter-fraud software, three men and two […]
The Money Laundering (Amendment) Regulations 2012 by David Winch
08 Nov 2012Amendments to the Money Laundering Regulations 2007 came into force on 1 October 2012, but what effect will these have on practitioners? The answer in most cases is likely to be ‘little or none’. It is now five years since the Money Laundering Regulations 2007 were introduced. HM Treasury believe that the regulations should be reviewed and […]
Confiscation – available amount
08 Nov 2012This article by David Winch article considers what is meant by a defendant’s ‘available amount’ and explains some of the rules the court must follow in determining the ‘available amount’. In confiscation proceedings against a convicted defendant the Crown Court will ordinarily have to separately determine two figures – the ‘benefit’ obtained by the defendant and his […]
Money laundering – entering into an arrangement – s328 PoCA 2002 by David Winch
01 Oct 2012Prosecutors are sometimes tempted, unwisely, to strain the meaning of statutory provisions in order to charge a defendant. There have been a couple of successful appeals recently against money laundering convictions unders328 Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 where a defendant has been charged with “entering into or becoming concerned in an arrangement which he knows or […]
Local authority to use Proceeds of Crime Act to crack down on rogue landlords
02 Aug 2012A London local authority is to crack down on rogue landlords using a law normally seen in fraud cases involving forensic accountancy expert evidence. Newham Council is to apply the Proceeds of Crime Act, originally aimed at stripping drug dealers of their ill-gotten gains, to seize money from people who charge desperate tenants a fortune […]
Forensic accountant for the high jump in charity bid
02 Aug 2012One NIFA member is aiming high in a bid to raise money to help adults with acquired brain injury. Forensic accountant, Roger Isaacs, is set to take one small step for him and one giant leap for the charity, Headway Somerset. Announcing his sponsored parachute jump, Mr Isaacs said he was ‘far too unfit to […]
The use of experts, including forensic accountants, is to be cut back in Family Court
31 Jul 2012The use of experts in Family Court, to include forensic accountants, is to be curbed under new UK Justice Ministry proposals. As a report by Mr Justice Ryder on the operation of child proceedings is published, the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Judge, warns that too many experts are being wastefully used, particularly in child proceedings. […]
Forensic accountants soon to dip a toe in the evidential ‘hot tub’
31 Jul 2012Experts have given a broad ‘thumbs up’ to evidential ‘hot tubbing’ in Court in experiments that could soon be introduced in trials involving forensic accountants. The new practice, where experts give evidence in the witness box together, is claimed to save costs and allow disagreements between experts to be understood and resolved by the court […]
Forensic accountants and other experts consulted in Family Court changes
31 Jul 2012Forensic accountants are amongst a wide variety of experts being consulted over proposed changes in the way specialists are used in Family Court. Hot on the heels of an update of the civil experts code, the move is aimed at private law financial remedy proceedings and all other family court procedures where expert evidence would […]
Forensic accountants feature in new experts code
31 Jul 2012Forensic accountants are being asked to brush up on a new version of the Experts Protocol published by the Civil Justice Council. The total rewrite, titled ‘Guidance for the instruction of experts to give evidence in civil claims 2012’, is aimed at helping litigants, those instructing experts and experts themselves, to understand what constitutes best […]
Forensic accountants unlikely to be caught on camera
11 May 2012UK Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke QC has unveiled plans to allow cameras in Court for the first time in British legal history but it seems unlikely that forensic accountants and other experts will appear live on TV. Mr Clarke said the move was aimed at making justice more publicly accessible than ever before when television […]
Forensic accountants key to a six million pound ‘fish scam’ confiscation hearing
24 Apr 2012Illegal fish catches cost nearly fifty million pounds in lost revenue, according to forensic accountancy evidence being considered by the High Court in Edinburgh. In a case that has become known as the ‘black fish’ scam, prosecutors are claiming that the company that helped quota dodging boat skippers land undeclared fish earned more than […]
Firm mounts fightback after forensic accountants uncover scandal
22 Apr 2012Shareholders at global camera giant, Olympus, have voted in a new board after forensic accountants in Japan uncovered a one billion pound scandal involving the hiding of losses going back over twenty years. The company had nominated new members to the board after all its previous team quit in the wake of the scandal, […]
Watch out there’s a forensic accountant about !!
11 Apr 2012Judges and forensic accountants appear to be the professionals to watch for when it comes to keeping a close eye on business expenses, according to an article in the Irish Times on the latest consumer gadgets. It describes one expenses tracking app for iPads and iPhones in particular and calls on the consumer to […]
Row breaks out over allegations that corruption investigation lacked forensic accountancy evidence
23 Mar 2012A row has broken out over allegations by former Irish Prime Minister Bertie A’Hern that an anti-corruption tribunal report “..had been arrived at without deploying the services of a forensic accountant..” The fomer Taoiseach’s statement came after a panel of enquiry investigating allegations of financial mismanagement concluded that Mr A’Hern had failed to give […]
Recruitment drive unearths the origins of modern forensic accountancy
19 Mar 2012The early origins of forensic accountancy have come to light from an unexpected source, the latest recruitment drive by the FBI to boost the number of investigators employed to follow the money and unearth evidence of modern crimes from terrorism to espionage, large-scale corporate frauds to the investigation of other complex financial schemes. It […]
Forensic accountants on standby to figure out allegations of expert witness perjury
11 Mar 2012Forensic accountants are set to check out the financial impact of allegations that expert witnesses have made false claims that could add up, said a senior judge, to perjury ‘on an industrial scale’. The allegations come amid a long-running battle between insurers and the credit hire companies who supply replacement vehicles to drivers involved […]
Forensic accountants land a big fish
07 Mar 2012Forensic accountants, working with police and officers from industry regulator Marine Scotland, have caught a fish scam on a grand scale. In what has been described by investigators as a widepsread and sophisticated fraud, forensic accountants followed the money trail and discovered tens of millions of pounds were unaccounted for. Over three years, seventeen skippers […]
NIFA member gets to grips with money laundering
14 Feb 2012In the latest crackdown on suspected money laundering, officers from HM Revenue and Customs have raided a canal boat moored in the centre of Leeds and arrested a sixty four year old man in a joint operation with police and the UK Border Agency. The man, named as Richard Williams, has been bailed to return […]
‘Clever accountants help the super rich dodge tax’ says a BBC investigation
11 Jan 2012A BBC investigation has alleged that ‘technical wizardry by clever accountants’ is helping the super rich to dodge tax. The investigation by Radio 4 consumer programme ‘You and Yours’ centred on a call by Prime Minister David Cameron for HM Revenue and Customs to get tough with rich people and companies who employ, in his […]
Forensic accountants to face giving ‘paperless’ evidence in Court
04 Dec 2011The Crown Prosecution Service is to experiment with ‘paperless’ criminal trials as lawyers in selected Courts are given laptops and electronic tablets. The plan could mean expert witnesses including forensic accountants giving evidence electronically rather than being questioned using large bundles of documents. The moves comes as the CPS tries to cut its budget by […]
Forensic accountant uncovers suspected Church fraud
21 Nov 2011A forty-seven year old woman has been arrested on suspicion of fraud after a forensic accountant found around ten thousand pounds of parishioners’ money had gone missing from a Devon church. Devon & Cornwall Police have launched an investigation into the allegations which relate to incidents between 2005 and 2011 at St Boniface’s Church in […]
Forensic accountants campaign against Government legal aid fee cuts
15 Nov 2011Forensic accountants are among a wide range of experts who have launched a campaign for a judicial review of a Government decision to force through caps on expert fees in publicly-funded cases before the Family Court. The organisation, known as the Consortium of Expert Witnesses to the Family Court, say that the action will focus […]
Witness fees ‘row’ hits leading UK accountancy firm
08 Nov 2011The Government of the Channel Island state of Jersey has claimed that a leading accountancy firm billed inappropriately for the cost of attending a hearing that was set up to examine the costs of a state enquiry into child abuse on the island. Deputy Trevor Pitman said his Education and Home Affairs sub-panel received a […]