Director of Revenue and Customs Prosecutions

The Revenue and Customs Prosecution Office (RCPO) was a non-departmental public body created under the Commissioners for Revenue and Customs Act 2005 as an independent prosecution body to take responsibility in the England, Wales and Northern Ireland for the prosecution of criminal offences in cases previously within the purview of the Inland Revenue and HM Customs and Excise (HMCE). In Scotland it was a Specialist Reporting Agency and the cases are then prosecuted by the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service. It was merged with the Crown Prosecution Service on 1 January 2010.

An increase in the independence of prosecutors from the compliance and investigation staff at the revenue departments was recommended by the Gower-Hammond Report in December 2000 and the Butterfield report in July 2003 following recent scandals and failed prosecutions, including the collapse of the London City Bond trial for evasion of tens of millions of pounds of excise duties as a result of the non-disclosure of the involvement of an unpaid Customs informant.

The RCPO was established on 18 April 2005, and was independent of HM Revenue and Customs (the new government department also created on 18 April 2005 under the Commissioners for Revenue and Customs Act 2005 by the merger of the Inland Revenue and HMCE). A memorandum of understanding laid out the boundaries between the work of the RCPO and HMRC. The RCPO is superintended by the Attorney General, and David Green QC was appointed as the first Director of the Customs and Excise Prosecutions in December 2004. RCPO coordinated its efforts with those of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and, from its inception in April 2006, the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA).

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