11 July 2003
The Assets Recovery Agency's legal powers to seize criminals' property still have to be tested in the courts, its director conceded this week.
Jane Earl said the agency had frozen £6m in assets in its first 100 days but had kept its performance targets for 2003/04 deliberately 'modest' until possible legal challenges had been worked through.
'The powers are not yet tested,' Earl said. 'We did expect to be challenged earlier and that is the reason for the relatively modest target in the first year. If we can be more successful, we won't be sitting back.'
The agency, set up in February under the Proceeds of Crime Act, has powers to seize the property of criminals following a successful criminal or civil prosecution.
It has set a target of 'disrupting' at least 35 'criminal enterprises'. Only four of these will relate to level three crime – serious and organised – as the agency would not 'necessarily pursue the Mr Bigs of this world,' Earl said.
Alan McQuillan, the ARA's deputy director, indicated that the agency's powers to recover property and gain access to financial records were robust, but he wanted to avoid a 'cascade of cases' being held up on appeal at the House of Lords.
'Once we are successful and see prosecutions improve, cases will escalate,' he added.
The agency, which is currently pursuing 17 cases in London and nine in Belfast, can also seize the assets of individuals who have already been cleared in criminal prosecutions.
McQuillan, who heads the agency's Belfast office, said they would pursue criminals through civil action and, if that failed, would take the same powers as the Inland Revenue and tax any proceeds of crime.
The agency will also use the proceeds from confiscation and taxation to become self-financing no later than 2005/06.
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