Anti-Bribery and Money Laundering
Organisations of all kinds face significant criminal and reputational risks in this area. We help our clients understand the practical implications of those risks, and to mitigate them.

The UK’s Bribery Act (2010) remains the world’s gold standard anti-corruption legislation. It prohibits a wide range of practices – including direct bribes, bribes via lavish hospitality, and facilitation payments – wherever they take place.

Importantly, organisations can be criminally liable for ‘failing to prevent bribery’, when an ‘associated person’ bribes another person intending to secure a business advantage. Associated persons can be anyone that provides services to the organisation, or provides services to others on their behalf – not just employees. There is an ‘adequate procedures’ defence, but this requires the organisation to show that it had assessed its bribery risks and put in place adequate procedures to mitigate them.

Help across the board

We have helped numerous clients to do just that, in various ways. A key element is advising on your compliance obligations, and on how to fully understand the risks that your particular organisation faces. Robust risk assessments are essential, and we can design and help to implement effective risk assessment processes. We are also often asked to create and deliver training packages for staff to help with compliance with statutory obligations.

For organisations that are under investigation by an enforcement agency, we provide a full range of legal support. This includes ensuring that requests for information are lawful and proportionate, and that enforcement agencies comply with principles of fairness. We use eDiscovery software to ensure that our work on discovery and data interrogation is efficient and productive. Typically, the defence strategy will evolve throughout the course of an investigation as new information becomes known and patterns of conduct emerge. We ensure that all avenues are explored, and provide clear advice as the situation develops. Our advice will remain confidential, as it benefits from legal professional privilege.

Anti-money laundering

The Proceeds of Crime Act (2002), or POCA, criminalises the proceeds of criminal conduct. It is a criminal offence to know or suspect that funds might be the proceeds of criminal conduct without reporting this to the authorities. The penalties for POCA offences are severe: a maximum of 14 years imprisonment, unlimited fines, and the civil recovery of criminal assets.

POCA is engaged wherever there is a benefit from criminal conduct, which applies to all criminal activity and to all statutory offences – including administrative-type crimes that carry criminal penalties for failures to obtain certain permits and licences. For example, because cutting down a tree that is subject to a Tree Preservation Order is a criminal offence in Scotland, any benefit from that will be classed as criminal property and POCA will need to be considered.

We frequently advise on the scope and application of POCA in corporate diligence exercises and where historical criminal offences have been uncovered, such as a failure to obtain licences. This includes assessing whether POCA does indeed apply, and advising on making requests for a defence to the National Crime Agency. These requests can be complex, and we also have expertise in drafting complex requests for defences.