Beverley: Man's oil bribery plot conviction quashed

An East Yorkshire man who was jailed over a £4.9m bribery conspiracy has had his conviction quashed by the Court of Appeal.

Stephen Whiteley, from Beverley, was convicted over an alleged plot to pay bribes to secure oil infrastructure contracts in Iraq.

Mr Whiteley, former Iraq territory manager for energy firm Unaoil, was jailed in July 2020.

He is the third man to have his conviction overturned in the case.

Mr Whiteley, 67, was jailed for three years after he was found guilty of one count of conspiracy to make corrupt payments.

He was convicted for his alleged role in the plot alongside Paul Bond, Basil Al-Jarah and Ziad Akle.

But in December 2021 Mr Akle's conviction was overturned after three judges found that the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) had "failed fundamentally" to provide documents that "had a clear potential to embarrass the SFO in their prosecution of this case" over its contact with US citizen David Tinsley.

Senior judges had previously said the SFO "should have had nothing to do with" Mr Tinsley.

Mr Bond's conviction was also quashed by the Court of Appeal in March, finding that the SFO's failure to disclose the documents had made the conviction unsafe.

Mr Whiteley made an unopposed bid to overturn his conviction on similar grounds at the Court of Appeal on 21 July.

Mr Justice Jay, sitting with Lord Justice Holroyde and Mr Justice Bennathan, said that the SFO "accept there is no material distinction to be drawn" between Mr Whiteley's case and those of Mr Bond and Mr Akle.

The judge said he was "grateful to the SFO for their realistic approach" and that the conviction must be quashed.

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