The trial of former SFO employees was suspended for 24 hours

Two former senior Serious Fraud Office (SFO) officials who face a seven-week civil trial over the fallout from an investigation into a Kazakh mining company have now been detained for 24 hours.

John Gibson, partner at Cohen & Gresser, and Tony Puddicstill, still senior SFO investigator, are defending charges of abuse of power, conspiracy and breach of trust. The SFO also defends itself against the claims, with a spokesperson remarking: “We firmly reject the ENRC’s allegations.”

This case follows the long-running civil dispute launched by the Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation (ENRC) in 2018 against the SFO, law firm Dechert and former partner Neil Gerrard over alleged misconduct.

Last August, after 10 years, the SFO closed its investigation into ENRC.

Mr Justice Waksman handed down a judgment in 2022 which found, among other things, that senior SFO officials acted out of “bad faith opportunism” by holding meetings with third parties to share “information” collected through ENRC.

The case is now back before the Supreme Court for a seven-week hearing, which said on Monday it would focus only on the SFO and senior executives this time. However, ENRC’s lawyer told the judge that the parties were in discussions to reach an agreement.

It is understood that the main elements of the deal have been agreed, but some terms still need to be discussed. The parties asked the judge this morning for an additional day for discussions, to which he agreed.

At lunchtime today, the judge noted that the seven-week trial will continue unless an agreement is reached by tomorrow.

The trial will focus on the witness statement from last June and will include further evidence from up to ten current and former SFO employees.

In addition, during the trial the court will consider allegations that Gibson arranged a meeting with Financial Times journalist Tom Burgis in an underground car park days before an article about ENRC’s investigation was published.

Puddick is accused of leaking information about the ENRC investigation to journalist Mark Hollingsworth.

Until recently, SFO and Gibson were jointly represented by Eversheds Sutherland, but back in June ENRC was informed that Gibson would then be represented separately by Slaughter & May.

The story has been updated to highlight the settlement freeze.