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ARTICLE · 23 JANUARY 2025

Enforcement Success: SFO Obtains Its First Unexplained Wealth Order

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The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has obtained its first ever Unexplained Wealth Order (UWO) in relation to a property valued at £1.5m.

United KingdomCriminal Law
Lorna Emson
Lorna Emson
James Reid
James Reid

The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has obtained its first ever Unexplained Wealth Order (UWO) in relation to a property valued at £1.5m. This success may increase the SFO's appetite to deploy UWOs as part of its investigations.

UWOs can be used by enforcement agencies to require respondents to explain the origin of assets where there are reasonable grounds for suspecting that those assets appear disproportionate to the respondent's income; or (since 2022) that they have been obtained through unlawful conduct. The UWO in this case was obtained against the ex-wife of Timothy Schools, who has been convicted for his role in a fraudulent scheme in which investors lost an estimated £100m.

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