Stefanou & Xanthaki: Financial Crime in the EU

The value of Google and other search engines seems to be the reason behind the current vogue of book titles which are snappy "key words," which means that publishers are looking for a word or phrase that internet searchers are looking for. Obviously, one very heavily searched for phrase is "Financial Crime." And so that's an attractive thing to call a book so that it leaps up the search engine rankings, if possible.

And calling a book "Financial Crime in the EU" suggests, to us at least, that it will provide research into fraud on the EU budget.

But the book is not, in truth, about financial crime at all: it's about the extent to which criminal records may be made available to enforcement agencies in other countries, whether they are available for due diligence by financial institutions and others, and limitations on the data collected, retained and disclosed.

And if that sounds as if that's dull and boring, think it through: in fact, the book is a vital collection of the law and regulation relating to collection, disclosure and use of criminal records in 11 EU countries, plus a couple of essays on the need for EU-wide co-operation on criminal records, especially in relation to organised crime.

Although billed as a "comparative analysis" there is little comparison of one country against another, and it's arguable that for the practitioner the information may be more readily accessible in tabulated form than in academic prose (although it is not obscure nor difficult to read).

The work is a fascinating study of how different countries adopt different approaches to the same issues, and even how similar approaches are differently applied. When the reader makes his own comparisons between countries, he will see that the intervention of the EU to provide a common pan-European system and standardised information exchange that not only will attempts to combat cross-border crime will be simpler, but also much cost and uncertainty will be saved because there will no longer be a need for bilateral MLATs and MoUs between countries.

The EU wastes a lot of time on examining its own navel and dealing with things that are, in reality, inconsequential. Its policy makers should be hit over the head with this book until they fix the issues it raises.

And for the MLRO? Access to criminal records would greatly aid his KYC. Why should he not have access to information that, if he happened to have a local newspaper from a small country town in another country five years ago he would have been able to read a court report in the public domain. It seems that MLROs are being told to do effective KYC but finding if a person is has a criminal record for an offence against a bank is difficult or, in some countries impossible.

As a matter of principle, justice is done in public so that justice is seen to be done. It makes sense for that public record to be made public until a conviction is "spent."

The book, without expressing that argument, makes a superb case for it.

The authors are to be congratulated.

Financial Crime in the EU - Criminal Records as effective tools or missed opportunites

Constantin STEFANOU & Helen XANTHAKI

Pub: July 2005 - Kluwer Law International

List price eur110 / USD140/GBP77

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