UK's Serious Fraud Office boss to retire half-way through tenure

By Kirstin Ridley

LONDON, Jan 15 (Reuters) - Nick Ephgrave, the head of Britain's Serious Fraud Office, said on Thursday he would retire at the end of March after two-and-a-half years in the post, saying he had spent 38 years in public service and was reaching his 60th birthday.

Becoming visibly emotional during a hastily-called news conference, the former senior police officer paid tribute to the enthusiasm and commitment of SFO staff and said the investigator and prosecutor had made enormous progress during his tenure.

"It has just been a joy, an absolute joy," he said.

Ephgrave, whose five-year term as SFO director started in September, 2023, said he had discussed his planned departure with the attorney general and expected an interim successor to be appointed while a formal recruitment process for a permanent successor gets underway.

The first non-lawyer to lead the agency, he took over as the SFO was fielding sharp criticism over abandoned prosecutions because of disclosure failures and serious missteps in a high-profile bribery case involving Britain's Unaoil that sapped staff morale.

He said his ambitions to run sharper, faster cases, improve disclosure with artificial intelligence and machine learning and to create a crypto-asset capability had been realised.

"I believe we have achieved what we set out to do: create a rejuvenated SFO that is strong, confident, dynamic and pragmatic," he said. "It has an even greater future ahead."

Emma Shafton, counsel at law firm Reed Smith, said the decision was a surprise and a successor would have big shoes to fill.

"In his short tenure, Ephgrave bolstered the SFO’s reputation after a period of heavy scrutiny. His successor will need to work hard to continue building on that momentum and capitalising on the gains that have been made."

Attorney General Richard Hermer said Ephgrave had modernised the SFO's approach to tackling serious fraud, bribery and corruption, strengthened its capabilities and secured important convictions in complex economic crime cases.