The key problem is that it is a civil matter. It's like a contract dispute - it's not a police matter. Obviously for the individual it's a major life-changing disaster... but in the eyes of the state it's equivalent to 'we ordered four cases of Coca-Cola but our vendor only delivered three'.
No. The criminal matter, as alleged, is that someone scammed the buyer, the solicitors and the Land Registry into believing that they are who they were not. That is not a civil matter, it is I believe fraud.
If a bloke sells their house, but then gets cold feet, or not happy with the compensation that is a civil matter. This is not what is alleged.
> it is unclear why the police told him it was civil
It's just typical first level support. Police didn't see any obvious simple solution and wanted the issue out of their hair so they said the thing which usually gets the issue out of their hair. The person persisted and escalated the issue higher. (for example to the news papers.) And now "The BBC put Mr Hall in touch with Bedfordshire Police's fraud squad, which has begun an investigation."
Because there are three parties, and only one of them committed a crime. The one who currently has the house and the one who lost the house have not -- their dispute is civil. The criminal was long gone by the time the police arrived.
They're referring to the parties at the house when the police were called. By all official accounts the house had been sold and the police couldn't find anyone to arrest.
I suspect the average PC called out to an argument between two seemingly innocent parties about ownership is going to want to get as far away from it as possible...
Maybe you know more about law in the UK than I, but I believe the criminal issue is between HM's Land Registry and the person who sold it, and there is only a civil issue between the rightful owner and anyone.
Criminal law in England and Wales is between the Crown (represented by a prosecutor, often but not always an arm of the state) and the alleged criminal. So the question 'who is the technical victim' isn't usually very interesting. The three salient questions here are:
1) Has the person committed an offence (probably yes: fraud by false representation, contrary to s.2 Fraud Act 2006);
2) Is there a reasonable prospect of conviction? (Who knows: will depend on the evidence); and
3) Is it in the public interest to prosecute? (Almost certainly yes).
'Who has been defrauded' doesn't even matter for establishing (1), only that the fraudster intended to make a gain for himself or a loss for someone else by making a false representation (in this case that he was the owner of the house). So in this case it really is a bit crappy from the police: if a fraud has been committed it doesn't in principle matter who complains about it, they should investigate (or at least register the crime) anyway.
Actually, in this case it should be both. It is a civil matter to get the house back, but obviously there was also some criminal fraud involved. The victim of the fraud though is presumably the land registry rather than the house owner.
Sure. But as a distant second place after having somewhere to live, I would also want the fraudster to go to prison. Assuming this article is correct, he was "told by the police they didn't believe a criminal offence had been committed here" which seems dumb.
