Petrofac cuts plea deal with UK’s serious fraud watchdog September 25, 2021 Oil services group Petrofac has cut a plea deal with the UK’s fraud watchdog in a bid to bring a close to a long-standing inquiry. The London-listed group has been at the centre of a Serious Fraud Office (SFO) inquiry into suspected bribery, money laundering and corruption. Petrofac plead guilty to seven separate charges of [...]
City bribery: British American Tobacco accused of arranging Mugabe bribe September 13, 2021 One of the largest tobacco companies in the world has been accused of bribing Robert Mugabe, the former president of Zimbabwe. City-based British American Tobacco (BAT) was part of negotiations to pay between $300,000 and $500,000 to Zanu-PF, Mugabe’s political party in 2013, according to a BBC Panorama investigation, which will be aired this evening. [...]
Serious Fraud Office probing O2 bribery allegations September 5, 2021 Telecoms giant O2 is being investigated Serious Fraud Office reportedly over allegations of bribery involving the company’s executives. The company revealed in a financial statement that it is cooperating with the SFO, following its merger with Virgin Media. O2’s recent £31bn merger with Virgin Media makes the new company the UK’s largest network, ahead of [...]
Corruption in the City: Pinning down companies’ criminal accountability July 28, 2021 This summer marked 10 years since the UK Bribery Act 2010 came into force. Amongst many new powers granted under the law, a particularly significant one was that of the ‘failure to prevent’ corruption or bribery, under which businesses could be held liable and responsible for the actions of their subordinate, unless they had sufficiently [...]
Autonomy founder and billionaire Mike Lynch can be extradited to the US, court rules July 22, 2021 British tech billionaire and Autonomy founder Mike Lynch has lost an attempt to block extradition to the US on fraud charges, a court ruled today. Lynch faces decades in prison if found guilty over the £7.1bn sale of his software company Autonomy to Hewlett-Packard in 2011 and will go to California to answer criminal charges. [...]
Questions pile up for Gupta after ‘deeply discourteous’ inquiry snub July 14, 2021 MPs on the parliamentary business committee have written to steel tycoon Sanjeev Gupta criticising his “deeply discourteous” decision not to appear before an enquiry into embattled Liberty Steel. They also questioned the “unusual extent to which you personally control the finances of Liberty Steeland its associated companies”. Gupta is the chief executive and chairman of [...]
‘Memory affected by long Covid’: Top City lawyer denies lying under oath July 9, 2021 City lawyer Neil Gerrard rejected the notion he lied under oath during a multimillion-pound High Court trial after text messages emerged suggesting he knew one of his client’s senior employees was secretly giving evidence to investigators. Gerrard and his firm Dechert represented Kazakh mining giant Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation (ENRC) between 2011 and 2013, investigating [...]
UK Bribery Act 10 years on: Have City firms improved their anti-corruption conduct? July 1, 2021 Today it is ten years ago that the UK Bribery Act 2010 came into force, on 1 July 2011. What has changed? The law presented itself as a radical and comprehensive overhaul of UK anti-bribery and corruption law, while its introduction was spearheaded by the Ministry of Justice and Serious Fraud Office (SFO), looking to [...]
City lawyer Neil Gerrard of Dechert denies allegation he was ‘in rape mode’ June 30, 2021 A top City lawyer alleged to have told colleagues that he was going to “screw” his client for millions of pounds in fees has emphatically denied the claim, telling the High Court it was “utterly ridiculous”. Kazakh mining giant Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation (ENRC) is suing its former lawyer Neil Gerrard for allegedly leaking confidential [...]
New boss at Liberty Steel UK as GFG restructuring continues June 28, 2021 Sanjeev Gupta’s GFG Alliance has today replaced Liberty Steel UK’s boss as it continues to overhaul its embattled operations. In a restructuring update, the company said that Roy Chowdhury would take over from Jon Ferriman as chief executive. It also said it was exploring the possible sale of Liberty Steel’s UK engineering business. The moves [...]