Appeal over SFO’s search of law firm

The Serious Fraud Office yesterday took to the Court of Appeal its battle to investigate an Auckland law firm alleged to have stymied a probe into a $14.9 million property deal.

The SFO has asked the court to overturn a High Court ruling that prevented it from analysing the material it obtained during a search in 2003.

The SFO searched the law firm's offices after deciding two partners, who acted for suspects the SFO was investigating, might themselves be implicated in the alleged fraud. Computers, the firm's server and clients' records dating to 1993 were seized.

However, the law firm, which has name suppression, went to the High Court and succeeded in having the search warrant, issued by the District Court, quashed.

Justice Paul Heath said the SFO should have told the District Court judge that the two lawyers had admitted holding documents relevant to the inquiry and had agreed to co-operate.

Yesterday, SFO lawyer Kristy McDonald, QC, said Justice Heath's ruling should be overturned and material the SFO surrendered to the court that was held in a sealed container released.

Representing the law firm, John Billington, QC, argued that the SFO failed to disclose his client's offer of co-operation and should have attached conditions to the warrant "too wide" in its terms.

He said the result of the search was a breach of legal professional privilege, with 99 per cent of the information seized belonging to the lawyers' clients.

The SFO "driving up Queen St" with the firm's server and back-up tapes risked the "whole thing" being destroyed in a car accident.

The case stemmed from a $14.9 million property deal between a now bankrupted insurance broker and a second client of the law firm. The lawyers deny any wrongdoing.