The “hen house”… the largest British campaign against fraud

“Hen House” is the name given by British police to their recent massive anti-fraud campaign that led to the seizure of £6.2 million worth of luxury sports cars, luxury watches and jewellery, along with cryptocurrency, cash and gold seized by fraud gangs in London and several other cities. In addition to the confiscation of these valuable commodities, the London police arrested more than 290 people during the campaign, which lasted for a month, and the British police announced it recently after its completion. The crimes committed by the 290 fraudsters who were arrested during the campaign included fraud crimes of various types, including what is known as fraud Romance, as well as bank or bank fraud, insurance policy fraud, in addition to money laundering and perverting the course of justice. The expanded UK police ‘Hen House’ campaign, funded by the National Economic Crime Centre, was made possible by the close collaboration of multiple police forces across the UK – 43 police forces and eight regional organized crime units – including the London Metropolitan Police and the National Fraud and Economic Crime Headquarters Force. It is the force that undertook the general coordination operations between the various forces during the campaign. The share of the city of London, the capital, was great in this process, as 14 arrest warrants were executed during this campaign, and 37 perpetrators of fraud were arrested, and more than 1.1 million pounds sterling of watches and cars were confiscated jewellery, and over £25,000 in fake electronics and branding. One of the most dramatic cases in terms of humanity was the arrest of a fraudster who was suspected of defrauding an elderly woman who lived in West Wales, and the suspect had pretended to be a bank official when he introduced himself to the elderly woman who seemed to him an easy target, and then used her bank card To transfer money to his own account and after the arrest of the fraudster put in place certain measures to secure the victim. Increase in fraud crimes Over the past period, reports speak of a significant increase in fraud operations in Britain, driven by the growing living crisis and the high cost of energy bills and others. The National Audit Office had said in its latest report a few days ago that the government had lost an amount of 21 billion pounds sterling due to fraud Since the start of the pandemic, the office in charge has warned that returning most of that money to British taxpayers seems “very unlikely”. In its report, the office indicates that many public bodies in the United Kingdom are unaware of the risks and extent of fraud they face, and it reveals that fraud levels in the country have risen from a total of 5.5 billion pounds sterling recorded during the two years preceding the outbreak of the Corona pandemic to a total of 21 billion pounds sterling during the two years following the outbreak of the pandemic. The office specialized in auditing accounts attributes a large part of the financial fraud losses to the programs implemented by the British government during the pandemic with regard to employing and subsidizing the most affected classes, as it says that seven billion pounds out of 21 billion pounds is the amount of financial losses for fraud crimes due to those government programs. And at a time when fraud is spreading like wildfire in Britain, as specialists say, and leads to the loss of billions of pounds sterling from taxpayers’ money, the matter turns into a political debate, as many Britons criticize the conservative rule and what led to the spread of fraud of all kinds, while the government says The current Conservatives are working on reforming the way fraud is dealt with. Labor says it has a clear plan to prevent fraud, punish criminals and protect British society.