Fraud is the British white collar crime and it has a long and dishonourable history in Britain. Business fraud was estimated at 3.3 billion pounds in 1995 and to combat the sophistication of frequently intelligent and ingenious fraudsters, the Serious Fraud Office was set up in April 1988 to handle frauds involving more than five million pounds. Since then, a long list of high-profile failures (or at the very least, strategic blunders) has called the purpose of the SFO into question. This account of the first six years of the SFO will do little to enhance its reputation. The new edition has been updated to include the role of the SFO in the trial of the Maxwell brothers.