‘I Know Better’ Culture at Serious Fraud Office May Be Changing, Inspector Tells MPs

A statue holding the scales of justice is seen on top of the Old Bailey in London, on Dec. 12, 2003. Stephen Hird/Reuters

The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has had an “I know better” culture that dates from before the appointment of the current Director, Lisa Osofsky, in 2018, the House of Commons’s Justice Committee has been told by a senior inspector.

In July this year two separate reviews were published that identified a series of failings at the SFO which led to the collapse of two criminal trials—the Unaoil case, which involved alleged bribes paid to Iraqi oil officials, and the case of Simon Marshall and Nicholas Woods, Serco executives who were acquitted on the orders of a judge.