Blackstone's Guide to the Fraud Act 2006 [Paperback]

Fraud is a socio-legal concept of much complexity. Fraud, like all crime, is a result of a combination of psychological and sociological factors.
Although the word 'fraud' had been bandied through the centuries, there has never before been a legal defi'nition of `fraud' in English law. English offences of fraud are found in various Acts and were thus counted by the Home Office. The Law Commission, Report No.276, Cm 5560 (2002), suggested bringing all such offences under an umbrella offence of fraud and now there is the UK Fraud Act 2006.

Section 1 of the Fraud Act creates an offence of fraud if committed by a person who breaches sections 2, 3, or 4. Section 2 deals with fraud by false representation, section 3 deals with fraud by failing to disclose information and section 4 deals with fraud by abuse of position. One example of potential complexity is the issue of fraudulent trading which is defined in the Companies Act 2006, section 993 and the Insolvency Act 1986, sections 213 and 357.

The reader is told that although the Fraud Act 2006 is a major change in the law, there are already many current legal 'weapons' for prosecuting fraud that remain in UK legislation such as: Value Added Tax Act 1994- dealing with tax evasion; Criminal Justice Act 1993 - dealing with insider dealing, Theft Act 1968 - dealing with false accounting; Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 -dealing with misleading market practices and Companies Act 2006 - dealing with fraudulent trading.

Chapter 3, tackling agreements to commit fraud, deals mostly with the mens rea in conspiracy and the mens rea in fraud conspiracies. Regarding mens rea of fraud offences, there is a two-way test for dishonesty- dishonesty by the ordinary standards of reasonable and honest people and where this is so, whether the defendant was aware that his conduct would be regarded as dishonest by reasonable and honest people. The accused must intend to make a gain for himself or another; to cause loss to another or to expose another to a risk of loss though gain or loss need not ensue and such gain or loss extends only to gain or loss in money or other property, property being real or personal.
As to false representation fraud as per section 2(1) of Fraud Act 2006, the actus reus is the making of a false representation. Section 2(3) Fraud Act defines a representation as any representation as to fact or law, including a representation as to the state of mind of the person making the representation or any other person. So the representation can be express or implied by conduct and therefore possible by omission, whether there is a duty to speak or not and section 2(5) provides that a representation may be regarded as made if it is submitted on any form to any system or device designed to receive, convey or respond to communications with or without human intervention. Section 3 Fraud Act covers silence or fraud by failing to disclose information. Moreover, 'false representation' are the words used in the Fraud Act rather than 'misrepresentation'. The mens rea for false representation is that the defendant knew the representation was untrue or might be untrue or that it was misleading or might be misleading, with intent to gain or cause loss dishonestly. Chapter 9 is concerned with fraud management and the future of fraud trials including the Fraud Protocol of March 2005.
Only a few books have been published on the Fraud Act 2006.

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Surprised there are no other reviews for this outstanding reference book. Quite invaluable. It is clear, concise while being comprehensive and very authoritative. An excellent reference work.