As of 12 June 2026, no prosecutions have been brought under s.250. This page tracks enforcement developments, the role of SFO-CPS joint guidance, and what the first prosecution will mean.
Note: Section 250 has not yet come into force (commencement: 29 June 2026). This page tracks the statutory landscape ahead of that date.
As of 2026-06-10, there have been 0 prosecutions brought under Section 250 of the Crime and Policing Act 2026. The Act received Royal Assent on 29 April 2026 and s.250 came into force on 29 June 2026 — less than two months ago at the time of writing. Enforcement agencies have not yet had the opportunity to identify, investigate, or charge any cases under the new provision.
This is the expected state at this stage. Criminal prosecutions of the type s.250 enables take months or years from the relevant conduct to charge. The provision applies where a senior manager commits a qualifying offence within the scope of their authority — investigation must establish the offence, the senior-manager status, the authority scope, and the attribution to the organisation. That timeline means the absence of prosecutions as of the commencement date tells us nothing about future enforcement intent.
When the first s.250 prosecution is brought, it will establish important precedents about how enforcement agencies interpret the s.250(3) "senior manager" test in practice. The statutory text is clear that the test is functional — it asks whether the individual "plays a significant role in (a) the making of decisions about how the whole or a substantial part of the activities of the body corporate or partnership are to be managed or organised, or (b) the managing or organising of the whole or a substantial part of those activities" (s.250(3)). What the first prosecution will show is how regulators and prosecutors apply that language to specific organisational structures.
Several questions will be answered by the first prosecution: How broadly do prosecutors read "substantial part of the activities"? Does holding only operational responsibility (not strategic authority) satisfy the test? How do courts treat organisations that identified their s.250 population and ran a documented gap analysis and declaration cycle — versus those that did not? None of these questions can be answered definitively until there is prosecutorial guidance and, ultimately, case law.
One thing the first prosecution will not change is the statutory framework. The s.250 corporate attribution mechanism is primary legislation. It does not create a new individual offence — it attributes a senior manager's underlying offence (under any UK criminal law) to the organisation. The organisation then faces the penalty for the underlying offence — on indictment, an unlimited fine in most cases (determined by the general sentencing rules for that offence, not by s.250 itself).
The Serious Fraud Office and Crown Prosecution Service are the two most likely agencies to bring s.250 prosecutions in the FCA-regulated sector, alongside the FCA itself for conduct falling within its regulatory perimeter. The SFO has published guidance on corporate criminal liability more broadly; the CPS publishes a Code for Crown Prosecutors that applies to all prosecutorial decisions.
Key charging considerations under the Code for Crown Prosecutors include: (1) the evidential test — sufficient evidence to provide a realistic prospect of conviction; and (2) the public interest test — whether prosecution serves the public interest. On the public interest question, prosecutors typically consider whether the organisation took steps to address the problem when it became aware of it. A documented gap analysis and completed declaration cycle is not a statutory defence to s.250 (no adequate-procedures defence exists in s.250 — this is different from the failure-to-prevent-fraud offences in the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023). However, documented diligence may be relevant to prosecutorial discretion and, if a case proceeds, to mitigation at sentencing.
No Sentencing Council guideline specifically addresses s.250 penalties as of this date. Courts applying s.250 will work from the general sentencing framework for the underlying offence and any relevant corporate sentencing guidance. How much weight documented diligence will carry in that framework is currently unknown.
There are several developments worth tracking for firms concerned about s.250 enforcement trajectory. First, any SFO or FCA announcement of an investigation where s.250 may be in play — even if prosecution has not yet been brought. Second, the Joint SFO-CPS guidance specific to s.250, which has not yet been published as of this date and may provide detail on how the provision will be applied. Third, the outcome of the CJC (Civil Justice Council) and related consultations on evidence standards for AI-assisted compliance processes, which may affect how courts evaluate structured output from tools like CoverProof.
What firms should be doing regardless of enforcement timeline is completing their s.250 gap analysis and declaration cycle before any investigation touches them. An organisation that identifies its Section 250 population, obtains declarations, and maintains a tamper-evident audit trail is in a fundamentally different position from one that has not — whether that matters is for prosecutors and courts to determine, but the documented record is the prerequisite for making any mitigation argument at all.
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