Patrick Rappo, who was co-head of anti-corruption enforcement at the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office, is now a partner in the firm’s London office.

Former SFO Director Richard Alderman is subjected to pitiless hammering in Parliament for his handling of bonuses for the agency’s staff.

After vowing to return to prosecuting basics, SFO Director David Green brings fraud charges against the head of a collapsed hedge fund that his predecessor had failed to pursue.

The British agency that enforces the U.K. Bribery Act lacks basic staff training, its cases are poorly selected and its collation and analysis of evidence is found wanting, according to the report.

LONDON — In a dramatic new turn in the scandals swirling around Rupert Murdoch’s British newspaper outpost, prosecutors said on Tuesday that two former top executives will be charged with paying bribes of up to $160,000 to public officials in addition to several earlier charges against them

The Crown Prosecution Service identified the onetime aides as Rebekah Brooks, 44, and Andy Coulson, 44, both of whom have had close personal or professional ties to Prime Minister David Cameron. The British leader hired Mr. Coulson as his director of communications while in opposition and kept him on after coming to power in the 2010 elections.

On Tuesday, Mr. Coulson, 44, a former editor of The News of the World tabloid, denied two counts relating to periods before he joined Mr. Cameron’s staff in 2007, and said he would fight them in court.

The new Serious Fraud Office director David Green said today that the irregular approval of nearly $700,000 in exit pay for a senior official had not been his decision but that of his predecessor.

CLICK HERE to download the consultation responses, the tabled amendments, and the Oct. 23 speech in which U.K. Solicitor General Oliver Heald QC, announced the decision to move forward with deferred prosecution agreement legislation.

Up until recently, Britain’s Serious Fraud Office had given companies a clear and explicit incentive to reveal potential foreign bribery violations to prosecutors — a promise that such voluntary disclosure would at least help avoid criminal penalties.

Britain’s Serious Fraud Office on Monday released toughened new rules on corporate bribery, reflecting new SFO leader David Green’s more traditional approach to prosecutions and marking a significant erasure of the work of its previous director, Richard Alderman.