White Collar Crime and Serious Fraud

Nick Barraclough developed his fraud practice at 187 Fleet Street which is renowned for its expertise in cases involving white collar crime and serious fraud. He has been involved in cases of money laundering, MTIC fraud, excise fraud, diversion fraud, long-firm fraud, benefit fraud, mortgage fraud and serious fraud prosecuted by the Serious Fraud Office.
The following are some such cases Nick Barraclough has undertaken recently:

• R v B and others, 2011: Six defendants were charged in relation to mortgage frauds. Nick Barraclough's client was charged with twelve offences of fraud and false accounting. The prosecution were forced to drop the case against his client on the second day of the trial after submissions and disclosure requests made by Nick Barraclough.



• R v Butt, 2011: Represented a woman who admitted insurance fraud by faking her death in Pakistan to obtain £2.2 million life assurance. Nick Barraclough was instructed to mitigate and obtain a favourable sentence.
  
  Conwoman faked own death from dehydration in remote Pakistan hospital to claim £2m life insurance, by The Daily Mail



• R v M, 2010: Cigarette smuggling and money laundering: represented a man accused of a large-scale conspiracy to import cigarettes from Europe. The defendant wanted to plead guilty and Nick Barraclough secured him a favourable sentence, and avoided Confiscation Proceedings.
  Padiham man in plot to smuggle two million cigarettes, by Burnley Citizen



• R v Shergill, 2010: Nick Barraclough and Simon Mayo QC were instructed by Bark & Co to contest Confiscation Proceedings following the defendant's conviction of an MTIC fraud and money laundering case. The prosecution sought £3.4 million from the defendant. They got £13,000.



• R v N and others, 2009, Kingston Crown Court: Nick Barraclough’s client was accused of transferring criminal property. She was alleged to have used her position as an accounts payable clerk to set up false customer accounts to which she wrongly transferred more than £500,000. Following mid-trial legal submissions from Nick Barraclough, the prosecution changed the charges. Nick Barraclough then successfully argued that the prosecution had no case on the new charges. The case against his client was halted and a not guilty verdict was recorded. The two co-defendants were subsequently convicted.



• R v Morgan and others (Operation Carina) : Successfully defended in a £50 million alcohol diversion fraud. It was successfully argued that the prosecution was an abuse of process by Customs and Excise. The case was seen as a key attempt by Revenue & Customs to prosecute organised alcohol smugglers after the critical Butterfield Report critical report into its procedures. The collapse of this six-year prosecution called into question a series of forthcoming trials when the defence showed that HMRC failed to reveal fully its links with the operators of bonded warehouses, that HMRC lied to the court about the reasons for delays in bringing the case (which they had attempted to cover up), that there was likely to be missing evidence that could undermine the reliability of witnesses, and that evidence was compromised because it may have been given from witnesses indemnified from prosecution. There was also a London City Bond connection.



• R v R and 5 others, 2010: Leading prosecution counsel in a six week trial of six men involved in a ‘long firm fraud’. The defendants set up sham companies, and created fraudulent accounts, to falsely obtain credit accounts and credit ratings. They then ordered goods valued at nearly £1million on credit. They then disappeared with the goods which they never paid for. All but the most minor participant were convicted.



• R v Khatab Defended in this Serious Fraud Office (SFO) prosecution of a defendant accused of conspiring to obtain hundreds of thousands of pounds of investment from American doctors in respect of a curry factory that never existed.



• R v Moruthoane etc Successfully prosecuted 5-week ‘long-firm’ fraud which involved the setting up of a series of false companies through which £600,000 of computers were fraudulently obtained. Some of the ciminal property was sold on Ebay.



• R v Rameshkumar Successfully prosecuted the defendant in a 5-week money laundering and possession of criminal property trial in which the defendant used cloned credit cards and credit card details obtained from petrol station employees to obtain hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of designer goods. Police discovered an Aladdin’s cave of goods in his house. He also fraudulently applied for a mortgage.



• R v T Represented the defendant who admitted a series of deceptions. He duped a national recruitment agency into believing he worked closely with Bill Gates on behalf of whom he was taking over a UK business in which the agency had placed him, and that he required a PA. The agency provided interview facilities and female interviewees for this 21 year old. It was also alleged he used the Financial Times taxi account to fund his personal travel, including a round trip to Aberdeen (at £3,600). Nick Barraclough secured the defendant a Suspended Sentence.