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23 March 2007 / Nicholas Yeo
Issue: 7265 / Categories: Features , Fraud , Company , Constitutional law
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Bull's-eye (2)

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In his final article on the Fraud Act 2006, Nicholas Yeo discusses the common law conspiracy to defraud

Few would disagree with the Attorney General’s contention that, before the introduction of the Fraud Act 2006 (FrA 2006), deception offences were “too precise, overlapping and outmoded to give effective coverage over the breadth of frauds committed today” (speech to Annual Financial Crime Conference, 15 November 2005).

Before FrA 2006 came into force, on 15 January 2007, if a woman walked into a bank with a crude letter stating “please give this person £100” and her efforts failed, then the offence she would have committed would depend upon the form in which she was seeking to obtain the money:

  • if cash, the offence would be attempted obtaining property by deception (Theft Act 1968 (TA 1968), s 5);
  • if transfer to another account, then the offence would be attempted obtaining a money transfer by deception (TA 1968, s 15A); or
  • if she were accompanied by a collaborator, she would have committed a conspiracy to defraud at common law, but
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