Aziz Rahman explains the SFO’s disclosure difficulties to The Wall Street Journal

With the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) seeing its case against G4S executives collapse due to disclosure failings, The Wall Street Journal sought Aziz Rahman’s opinion on the case.

The SFO took the decision to end its prosecution of the three former executives for fraud because of issues over the sharing of evidence with the defence. It is the third major prosecution to collapse due to SFO disclosure shortcomings in two years, following the Unaoil and Serco cases.

Aziz explained to The Wall Street Journal that the SFO has faced difficulties working through large amounts of electronic evidence and in meeting its obligations to share material with defence teams that could potentially clear their clients.

He added that things have moved on greatly from when most records of business activity were kept on paper – and that SFO procedures have to be adjusted to meet the demands of the digital era.

Aziz’s comments featured in the Wall Street Journal’s article about the case.

Aziz was also asked about the case by Law360. He said that the SFO was “once again suffering huge, self-inflicted wounds," with G4S being “just the latest example of the agency turning the weapons it had at its disposal on itself."

The Law360 article can be read here.

Featured at: Wall Street Journal