SFO off target with consumer scam victims
The Serious Fraud Office should stick to conducting investigations involving big ticket corporate cases rather than helping consumers who might have fallen victim to various scams
Andrew Durant, managing director of fraud investigations at foresenic
accounting firm Navigant, said he found it ‘strange’ the new head of the
SFO, Richard Alderman,
wanted to concentrate on helping consumer fraud victims.
‘The SFO was given
special powers for a reason to tackle serious fraud. It needs to stick to its
charter, otherwise who else is going to do it? It should look at high-value
public interest cases.’
He warned that there was likely to be more large-scale fraud as the UK
started to head for a downturn.
Durant added that the SFO’s possible change of direction could be because of
other organisations’ success in tackling high-profile cases.
These include the Office of Fair Trading looking at construction companies
over bid-rigging and milk price fixing, plus the City of London Police as the
lead investigator for the National Fraud Strategic Authority.