SFO search 'breached injunction'

The Serious Fraud Office "breached the spirit" of two injunctions when it used a search warrant to seize and copy information from computers during the Sumitomo copper market fraud investigation, the High Court ruled yesterday.

But SFO director George Staple (left) and four of his senior investigators were cleared of any contempt of court.

However, in a final settlement of the issue, Mr Edwin Glasgow QC, for the SFO, admitted that the search warrant used to remove the computers from Kay Accounting last December was "too widely drawn" and should be quashed.