The UK’s anti-corruption agency has applied for an employment tribunal, brought against it by one of its former senior employees, to be held in secret.
The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) is being sued for unfair dismissal by Tom Martin, a former prosecutor responsible for leading corruption investigations.
He was sacked last year for gross misconduct, after allegedly swearing at an FBI agent in a pub.
The SFO confirmed it had asked for a hearing of the employment tribunal, which is scheduled for December, to be held behind closed doors. It has asked for reporters to be barred from attending the hearing.
Martin led the agency’s investigation into allegations that Unaoil, a Monaco-based oil and gas consultancy, paid large bribes to secure contracts in the energy industry around the world.
The investigation, one of the largest being run by the SFO, was launched in March 2016 following reports by investigative reporters working for the Australian newspaper the Age.
The inquiry has involved extensive collaboration with prosecutors in the USA, including the FBI and the Department of Justice.
Martin was dismissed last December after the agency decided he had sworn at an FBI agent and called him a “quisling” and a spy, according to a document outlining his claim before the employment tribunal.
The incident is alleged to have happened in May 2016 after British and American prosecutors working on the investigation went to a London pub after a meeting.
Martin is alleging that relations, particularly with the American prosecutors, were at times considerably strained, according to the document.
He is arguing that strong language among law enforcement was commonplace and would not constitute gross misconduct.
He alleges in the document that he was sacked following a complaint last year by the Department of Justice and a member of the Ahsani family, which founded and ran Unaoil.
The SFO said it could not comment on “personnel issues”.
On Wednesday, Martin told the Guardian: “The fact that a public body may find the ventilation of facts before a tribunal embarrassing does not render them secret.”
A source close to the SFO said it would not apply to hold a hearing in secret unless it believed that a public airing of the case was likely to jeopardise an active investigation or other sensitive activities.
