Company Fraud
Offences involving directors' disclosure, financial assistance, prohibited loans and share transactions, insolvency offences, falsification, destruction or suppression of records, false accounting, false statements by company directors, fraudulent trading and directors' disqualification under Company Directors Disqualification Act 1986.

The Fraud Act 2006
New offences are created by the 2006 Fraud Act which came into force in January 2007. These include false representation, failure to disclose information and abuse of position.
It is no longer necessary to prove that the victim was deceived: all that is required is to prove that a person was dishonest in his behaviour and that he intended to make a gain for himself or cause a loss to another.

Frauds on Creditors
Offences in winding up or bankruptcy. False declarations of solvency, concealment or disposal of property. Falsification of documents. Obtaining credit by deception.

Frauds on Investors
Misleading statements, market manipulation, mis-selling and insider dealing.

Frauds on the Public
Cheating the public revenue. Frauds on HMR&C. Frauds on the European Community. Social Security fraud. Public Bribery and Corruption; inducements and rewards to officials of public bodies.

Extradition and Mutual Legal Assistance
On 1 January 2004, the Extradition Act 2003 came into force. The United Kingdom has extradition relations with more than 100 countries under multilateral extradition conventions or agreements, or under bilateral extradition treaties.
Mutual Legal Assistance is the formal way in which countries request and provides assistance in obtaining evidence located in one country to assist in criminal investigations or proceedings in another country.

Money Laundering
Criminal confiscation and money laundering offences are inter-linked. Money Laundering is the process by which criminal proceeds are sanitised to disguise their illicit origins. Money laundering schemes can be very simple or highly sophisticated. Most sophisticated money laundering schemes involve three stages:

• Placement - the process of getting criminal money into the financial system;

• Layering - the process of moving money in the financial system through complex webs of transactions, often via offshore companies;

• Integration - the process by which criminal money ultimately becomes absorbed into the economy, such as through investment in real estate.
Prosecutions for money laundering can involve any of these stages in the money laundering process. Money laundering includes aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring.
Bivonas advise in relation to money laundering offences and money laundering regulations/ compliance.

Tax and Special Compliance
We defend tax cases brought by the Revenue & Customs Prosecution Office. We have extensive experience of representing clients interviewed under caution pursuant to the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 in fiscal investigations by revenue and customs investigators.