Anti-Money Laundering Compliance and the Legal Profession

1 Anti-money laundering and the UK legal profession

DOI: 10.4324/9780429019906-1

1.1 Introduction

It has become apparent in recent decades that the services offered by the legal profession may be misused to launder money.¹ Whilst no comprehensive data exists demonstrating with any accuracy the extent to which money laundering has pervaded the UK legal profession, law firms must nevertheless comply with an extensive array of anti-money laundering (AML) measures.² It is the issues which such compliance gives rise to which are the subject matter of this book.

1 The material in this book is up to date as at June 2019 with the exception of the UK’s Economic Crime Plan 2019–22 which was published in July 2019. ‘Money laundering’ is the term used ...