Use Cases

iSanctuary wins permission to serve a Worldwide Freezing Order by NFT from a Singapore court in a legal-first for the country.

Wimbledon is here, as is the traditional rain, and Wandsworth prison is a stone’s

The client was represented in the largest-ever divorce settlement awarded in the UK courts. iSanctuary were tasked to identify the ultimate beneficial ownership of high-value properties in London and the current and previous owners of a super yacht. This information was critical as the client's (now former) husband appeared to have deliberately divested himself of all assets to avoid paying his wife a financial settlement in the divorce proceedings. <br /><br/> iSanctuary financial investigators and analysts established which properties in London were held under an offshore blind trust and attribution of use and ownership. Although the yacht had been sold, through inquiries in Europe, BVI and Asia, alongside extensive Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT) work, we established previous ownership of the client’s former husband and, importantly, the date of sale, how and to whom. All this information helped the client and her legal team prove the asset and its proceeds, made at the sale, were part of the financial portfolio of her former husband. <br /><br /> The client was ultimately awarded £100M in a divorce settlement.

Our client, a UK human rights charitable organisation, was seeking to make a case to present to the UK Government (HM Treasury) for the imposition of sanctions against members of the former regime under José Eduardo dos Santos of Angola. <br /> <br /> iSanctuary was instructed to undertake a financial investigation to establish whether specific individuals had real estate in the UK which, if confirmed, would strengthen the case for the imposition of sanctions by the UK against the individuals in question. <br /> <br /> We undertook extensive research in relation to the persons against whom the sanctions were being sought, utilising financial investigation skills to analyse corporate relationships and open-source intelligence (OSINT) research, including mapping and geo-location analysis to identify potential properties being used/owned by the subjects of the investigation. <br /> <br /> We identified several high-value London properties linked to one of the subjects; the information we gathered enabled the client to present a compelling case to HM Treasury for consideration.

Our client, an international charitable civil society organisation, commissioned iSanctuary to undertake a specific brief to research, investigate and provide evidence to support a private prosecution or private legal action against a corrupt actor from a country in the former Soviet Union who used the UK and other countries to launder the proceeds of their crime(s). <br /><br /> Working with civil society partners and counsel we undertook a comprehensive intelligence-gathering exercise to identify a potential subject for investigation, and identify real estate acquired possibly with criminal proceeds. <br /><br /> Having identified a potential subject, we initiated an investigation to gather evidence to support a prosecution, i.e. to support the assertion that the property in the UK they had acquired represented the proceeds of corruption. Our investigation included a review of significant volumes of documents and electronic media using in-house and proprietary document management systems. <br /><br /> Several European state actors were identified as having links to the suspected criminality arising from a series of corrupt business transactions connected to infrastructure projects. We assembled a compelling prime facie case for action, and we are currently awaiting a decision on the next steps.

iSanctuary were engaged by a law firm following the discovery that the finance director, of an international chemicals company, had stolen substantial amounts of money from his employer over a period of ten years. The theft was discovered following an audit that identified significant VAT underpayments, which consequently disclosed a ‘black hole’ in the company accounts. <br /> <br />The evidence pointed to criminality on the part of the finance director, who was not forthcoming in providing a detailed explanation of what he had done with the money. Without evidence confirming criminal behaviour, our client would have had to bear the responsibility of making good the deficit; therefore, it was imperative to locate assets gained through fraud and theft to help address significant monetary loss for the client. <br /> <br />Our brief was to conduct a forensic investigation of the theft, to establish where the funds had gone, and identify and recover criminal proceeds; this included deploying iSanctuary’s in-house forensic accountant and the forensic examination of associated computers and digital media. <br /> <br />Our investigation of the subject and his familial network identified properties, businesses, vehicles, personal assets, and substantial expenditures. We were able to illustrate how the stolen monies used supported the subject’s lifestyle, including substantial investments in a marital property which increased its value significantly, and investments into his wife’s current business. <br /> <br />We provided an evidential witness statement to support a successful Norwich Pharmacal Order application for associated banking material which provided supporting evidence of the subject’s criminality and movement of funds.

Our client, a Norwegian listed company; operating in the Renewable Energy industry sector, instructed iSanctuary to assist their ongoing litigation arising from their acquisition of Italian photovoltaic plants from a Luxembourg/Switzerland Joint Venture entity. <br /><br /> Previously, our client paid substantial monies to purchase the plants; within six days of purchase, two of the JV directors were indicted by the Italian authorities for fraud. As a result, the Italian National State Energy company suspended the awarding of tariffs for the photovoltaic plants, rendering them worthless. <br /><br /> Our remit focused on several aspects of the case, which had been in litigation since 2015, including criminal investigations concurrently being undertaken by the Italian Guardia di Finanza (GdF) and associated bankruptcy proceedings. <br /><br /> We built a bespoke digital case management system; employed by our client and their respective legal representatives. This was imperative to maintain the integrity of evidence, disclosure obligations and management of over 2TB of documents. Through analysis of disclosed material and our investigations, we discovered previously unknown complex corporate structures involved in the deal; mapped the money flows establishing which companies held assets and in what jurisdictions, and their ‘direct’ links to a sanctioned Russian PEP (Politically Exposed Person). <br /><br /> Identification of assets has been a crucial element in this case, as it has provided our client with the confidence to pursue and focus their litigation strategy as they now hold the knowledge that there are assets of circa EUR 200 million available. <br />We have prepared and submitted evidential statements; supporting our client’s action(s), given evidence of our findings in court, and engaged with law enforcement agencies in several jurisdictions to further our client’s case.

Our client was caught in an investment scam. He contacted iSanctuary in a desperate position and deeply concerned about the investment he had made; he was extremely distressed. The iSanctuary team immediately deployed and started to gather evidence of the crypto fraud from the victim's devices, laptop and from his account of events, they were also able to support and reassure the victim during this difficult time, he’d lost the equivalent of £2M in Norwegian krona. Lawyers acting for the victim also requested we conduct a full investigation. <br/><br /> Speed is critical in these cases due to the rapid nature in which crypto assets (coins) can transfer across the blockchain. Whilst our expert crypto investigators deployed to trace the crypto assets, our investigators obtained a detailed account of events and key identifiers. Our crypto investigators quickly identified each hop, through locating wallets, they determined they had all the characteristics of wallets holding the proceeds of crime (identifying other potential victims). <br /><br /> Meanwhile, our Open Source Intelligence Analysts (OSINT) were quickly tracking down the criminals. Our former Financial Conduct Authority investigator quickly established the registration number was fake. The trail of email addresses, crypto wallet IDs, telephone numbers and online presence led us to identify named individuals behind the scam operating from Central Europe. <br /><br/> The crypto assets were traced to a wallet held on an exchange in the Far East. Following a legal review with the client, the decision was taken to pursue the criminal complaint. iSanctuary investigators and analysts are experts in their fields and cognisant through many years of providing court-ready evidence. Statements, schedules, hash-tagged domains, intelligence, and charts were all prepared and handed over to the authorities demonstrating the evidence of the fraud, the hops, the destination of the crypto assets and the actors involved in the fraud, including their names and current locations. The authorities proceeded with the criminal investigation and prosecution.

iSanctuary wins permission

An Asset Tracer report was commissioned by our client, concerning a high-net-worth female POI, a socialite on the run, and subject to an Interpol red notice for her involvement in significant corruption by misappropriating public funds for her personal benefit. The large-scale international corruption offence saw the POI trading in state-owned oil, diamonds, and art worth billions.<br /><br /> Asset Tracer as a foundation of the investigation, highlighted a significant UK property portfolio linked to the POI and her familial network; however, steps by a network of professional enablers and facilitators had obfuscated ownership via a blind Isle of Man structure. Many investigations end here; however, to get behind this firewall our team was instructed to dive deeper into the data with our Asset Tracer + product. <br/> <br/> Asset Tracer + uncovered her digital footprint, including accessible social media accounts for not only the POI but her family network under a series of pseudonyms, with family members often proving the chink in the armour with less diligent personal security considerations.<br/> <br/> By forensically capturing the rich tapestry of media, including videos, our OSINT analysts placed the subjects at the property by matching subtle architectural details in the fore and background to the publicly available property plans. <br/> <br/> This generated a credible body of evidence of association linking the family’s pattern of life to the UK property as a ‘centre of gravity’, including details of the POI children’s education and schooling in the South Kensington area.<br/> <br/> Our team were also able to provide near real-time updates on the POIs location detailing international travel despite the red notice via geo-positioned images. Asset Tracer + is vital to support your legal teams in the forensic capture of globally sourced intelligence to build the strongest possible case to secure asset recovery.

The case concerned an exchange being sued for allegedly allowing cryptocurrencies, valued £25m, to leave a wallet after notice that it was the proceeds of crime. The case was following the developments in the UK High Court for <a class="text-grey-is font-semibold" target="_blank" href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjSA-JNvLMuYFVKowGrS76w?view_as=subscriber">Tulip Trading Ltd (a Seychelles Company) (appellant) v Wladimir Jasper van der Laan & ors (respondents).</a> <br /><br /> The client required forensic analysis of the transactions to determine if the exchange had allowed the coins to move transact on the blockchain through their exchange. They disputed the expert evidence presented to them by the claimant and demonstrating that the coins, belonging to the claimant, had not been held on their exchange. <br /><br /> iSanctuary crypto investigators and crypto experts analysed the claimant’s expert report. Our analysts, using their blockchain investigation tools, conducted four separate methods to trace all the transactions; all to test the first-in-first-out method. Each method of analysis proved the coins did not hop into a wallet held on the respondent’s exchange. Our experts were able to present evidence that directly challenged the claimants position and led to the respondent having a robust irrefutable defence and ability to challenge the £25M claim.

Acting for a private client, iSanctuary was commissioned to review a criminal investigation undertaken by a European anti-corruption agency following allegations of corruption, made by our client, against government officials in a position of influence for regulating the client’s business, a regulated financial institution. <br /> We were required to review voluminous amounts of investigative material and prepare an expert witness statement for service in civil proceedings, all within a noticeably brief time limit. We reviewed the material, which was not in the English language, and took into consideration both the regulatory framework and criminal investigation regime within the country in question. <br /> We were able to provide a comprehensive and detailed report, highlighting our expectations as to what an investigation (into allegations of state-level corruption) should cover as a bare minimum, highlighted specific areas where the investigation was assessed to be deficient, in terms of scope, and accentuated lines of enquiry that should have been considered and/or followed up.