The OSP has the mandate to investigate and prosecute, on its own, corruption and corruption-related offences including:
Dishonestly receiving property – where a person receives, buys, or assists in the disposal of property which the person knows has been obtained or appropriated by a crime, without intending to return the property to the owner Extortion – where a person obtains property from another person by means of threat of libel or slander, the threat of prosecution for an offence, threat of detention, and any other form of threat not involving assault or harm to the person threatened
Using public office for profit – where a public officer corruptly or dishonestly abuses his or her office for private gain or where a private person acts in collaboration with a private-public officer for the public officer to corruptly or dishonestly abuse his or her office for private gain
Corruption of and by public officer or juror – where a public officer or juror, in respect of his duties of office, directly or indirectly agrees or offers to permit his conduct as a public officer or juror to be influenced by a gift, promise or prospect of valuable consideration or where another person so corrupts a public officer or juror – this is commonly termed as bribery
Corrupt promise by judicial officer or juror – where a person makes or offers to make an agreement with another person as to the judgment or verdict which that person will or will not give as a judicial officer or juror in a pending or future proceeding
Corrupt selection of juror – where a person procures for that person or another person to be summoned, empanelled or sworn as a juror or endeavours to prevent a person from being summoned, empanelled or sworn as a juror for the purpose of securing an undue advantage or disadvantage to a party to a judicial proceeding
Corruption, intimidation, and personation in respect of election – where a person endeavours to influence the conduct of a voter in respect of an election by the threat of an evil consequence to be caused to the voter or to any other person, on account of the conduct of the voter, or seeks to corrupt a voter or impersonates another person in respect of an election
Falsification of return at an election – where a person, as a public officer charged with the counting of votes or the making of a return at a public election, willfully falsifies the tally of votes or makes a false return of the results
Withholding of public money by a public officer – where a public officer who is bound in that capacity to pay or account for money or a valuable thing or to produce or give a document or any other thing up fails to do so when lawfully requested to do so
Public procurement offences – where a person enters or attempts to enter into a collusive agreement, or influences the procurement process to obtain an unfair advantage, or alters procurement documents to influence the outcome, or requests for unpermitted clarification
Existent offences arising out of or consequent upon the above offences. These may be in the nature of –
Predicate offences – these are crimes that are components of other crimes – thus any offence as a result of which proceeds have been generated that may become the subject of any of the above offences
linked or related offences – these are crimes that are either-way or that may be charged jointly or in the alternative
Antecedent offences – these are crimes that precede or are prior to the above crimes
Existent offences include –
- Laundering of proceeds of crime –
- the acquisition, possession or use of property or currency knowing, at the time of receipt, that such property or currency is the proceeds of crime
- the conversion or transfer of property or currency, knowing that such property or currency is the proceeds of crime, for the purpose of concealing or disguising the illicit origin of the property or currency or of helping any person who is involved in the commission of that offence to evade the legal consequences of his or her action
- the concealment or disguise of the true nature, source, location, disposition, movement or ownership of or rights with respect to the property, knowing that such property is the proceeds of crime
- Illicit enrichment/unexplained wealth – a significant increase in the assets of a person that he or she cannot reasonably explain in relation to his or her lawful income – the gap between a person’s total wealth and their lawfully acquired wealth
- Bribery in the private sector – commercial bribery and kickbacks, extortion and solicitation, excessive gifts and hospitality, fees and commissions beyond standard practice to secure an undue advantage by influencing decision making
- Abuse of office – using the office for self-seeking purposes or for personal considerations
- Embezzlement – misappropriation or other diversions of property
- Influence peddling or trading in influence – payments or expensive gifts to secure an undue advantage from a public official, political donations with the intention of influencing political decisions
- Favouritism, nepotism, cronyism, clientelism – the offer of unfair preferential treatment at the expense of others
Obstruction of the administration of justice -
- the use of physical force, threats or intimidation, promise, offering, or giving of an undue advantage to induce false testimony or to interfere in the giving of testimony or the production of evidence
- the use of physical force, threats or intimidation to interfere with the exercise of official duties by a judge or law enforcement official in relation to the commission of corruption or corruption-related offence
- where a public officer refuses or fails, without reasonable excuse, to co-operate with the OSP
- where a person fails to comply with a lawful demand of the OSP
- where a person fails to produce a document or provide the information requested by the OSP
- where a person fails to produce property declared to be seized under Act 959
- where a person conceals or attempts to conceal property liable to seizure under Act 959
- where a person knowingly furnishes false information to the OSP
- where a person refuses to grant the OSP access to premises or refuses to submit to a search
- where a person assaults an officer of the OSP in the performance of his or her functions
- where a person obstructs an officer of the OSP from performing his or her functions
- where an officer of the OSP communicates confidential information to an unauthorised person or discloses the personal details of an informant to a third person without authority