Majeed v R.

An employee’s corrupt agreement to perform his work dishonestly may be an act in relation to the employer’s affairs or business, even where the employer neither knows of nor is expected to take any action in response. The employee’s performance may be integral to the employer’s business, and the employer may be the victim of the corruption.

Under Gambling Act 2005, section 42 creates an offence of cheating or assisting cheating. It is complete when the prohibited act is done for that purpose. A prosecution is properly within the jurisdiction where the corrupt fixing conduct occurred in England, notwithstanding that any resulting bets were placed abroad.

The conjoined appeals arose from cricket spot-fixing. Majeed, an agent for Pakistan cricketers, arranged for specified no-balls to be bowled during a Test match in return for payment. He pleaded guilty after adverse legal rulings to conspiracy to make corrupt payments and conspiracy to cheat at gambling.

Westfield, a professional county cricketer, accepted payment to concede runs in a specified over. He pleaded guilty to accepting a corrupt payment after a legal ruling; the prosecution did not proceed on the gambling count.

Both appellants challenged the legal rulings underlying their pleas. The issues were whether the corrupt acts were sufficiently connected with their employers’ affairs for the Prevention of Corruption Act 1906, and whether the gambling offence could be prosecuted when bets were made abroad.

1. The appeals against conviction were dismissed. The rulings that led to the guilty pleas were correct.

2. The court held that the corrupt-payment offences fell squarely within section 1 of the Prevention of Corruption Act 1906. The relevant inquiry was whether the employee’s corrupt act was in relation to the principal’s affairs or business. It did not require the employer to take, or be expected to take, consequential action.

3. Commissioner of the Independent Commission against Corruption v Ch’ng Poh [1997] 1 WLR 1175 did not assist the appellants. That authority concerned bribes wholly remote from the solicitor’s firm and directed only to the client’s affairs. Here, by contrast, the players’ honest performance was central to the business and affairs of the cricket boards that employed them.

4. The contracts reinforced that conclusion. They required the players to perform to proper standards and prohibited match-fixing and corruption. Their deliberate underperformance for payment was therefore directly connected with, and seriously damaging to, their employers’ affairs. The boards’ ignorance of the scheme confirmed that they were its victims, not that the conduct lay outside their affairs.

5. Section 42 of the Gambling Act 2005 was not confined to cheating in lawful gambling within the jurisdiction. The offence of doing anything to enable or assist cheating was complete before any bet was placed. The fixing was arranged in England, concerned matches played here, and involved payments here. The court therefore had jurisdiction, irrespective of any bets placed abroad.

• Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) — dismissed both appeals against conviction and upheld the legal rulings: [2012] EWCA Crim 1186.
• Crown Court at Southwark — Majeed pleaded guilty after an adverse ruling on the legal ambit of the charged offences.
• Central Criminal Court — Westfield pleaded guilty to accepting a corrupt payment after an adverse legal ruling; the prosecution did not proceed on the gambling count.