NCA v Jack Moore & Anor

This inter partes application, dated 19 February 2026, before the court is made to discharge an order previously made by Lang J on 20 January 2026 on the urgent ex parte application of the NCA.

Two recent orders have also made in this case, both on the papers and both by Obi J. One was made on 17 April 2026, refusing an application to cross-examine the NCA deponent, Mr Byrne; the other, amended on 21 April 2026 for clarity, maintained the order of Lang J of 20 January until the hearing of the application before me.

The NCA is an enforcement authority within the meaning of section 316 of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 which I shall refer to as POCA or “the Act”. Jack Moore, the first respondent, is a British national, who is believed to reside in Newcastle upon Tyne. He is the sole director and shareholder of the second respondent, Timepiece Trading Limited, to which I shall refer as "Timepiece". Timepiece was incorporated on 1 August 2019, with a registered office address at Bridge End, Leeds.

The business is listed as "retail sale of watches and jewellery in specialised stores". The sole director, shareholder and Person with significant control is Mr Jack Moore. The company operates under the name "Watch Trader & Co" and trades from premises in Newcastle upon Tyne.

The matter came to court in the following way: during a police search of Watch Trader and Co’s premises in October 2022, 580 high-value watches were seized. A criminal investigation was in progress and continued. Of these, 498 became subject to a restraint order under section 41 of POCA, made at Newcastle Crown Court on 3 June 2024. In the event, the NCA did not put the matter to the CPS for charging a criminal offence. It was, and is, the NCA's case that a number of those watches – 174, was the estimation at the ex parte application – are the product of unlawful conduct and, therefore, recoverable property under part 5 of the Act.

There were two categories of items:

The NCA sought the order urgently and ex parte. Before me, it is said by Mr Chris Daw KC, leading Alexander Bennie, on behalf of the respondent, Mr Moore, and his company, that the application was not carefully or properly brought. It ought never to have been made ex parte. The stated risks of dissipation of assets were, in effect, illusory and the obligations of disclosure were breached. Accordingly, the order should be set aside by this court.

The NCA, when it sought the order, put in a skeleton argument from counsel, Mr Conway, and a long statement from its officer, Mr Byrne. It explained the reasons for seeking the order, including in these terms,

The NCA explained the basis of their application to the court in January in the following way:

The NCA has described this application to discharge the order as, first, misconceived and, secondly, concerning matters that are not material and, thirdly, in any event, matters that would not justify the discharge of the property freezing order, even if those matters were material.

The relevant parts of the statutory framework are sections 245A and 245B of the Act.

The most material parts for our purposes are as follows.

As to the variation of property freezing orders, section 245B provides relevantly.

There was no material dispute between the parties as to the effect of the case law, although emphasis on it was differently laid by each side. The helpful skeleton argument set out in detail the court's analysis, the main points of which, and which I apply in this case, are as follows.

In particular, in the case of NCA v Simkus [2016] EWHC 255 (Admin), Edis J, as he then was, considered in detail the previous authorities on the general duty to make full-and-frank disclosure and the consequences of any non-disclosure, including the case of Brink's Mat Limited v Elcombe [1988] 1WLR, at 1350.

As to a good arguable case, under section 245A(5) above, there is copious law on this issue as a test in law. As set out before Lang J in the case of Bredis, Fordham J held that the threshold is, "a relatively low one" (see paragraph 8).

In the well-known case of The Niedersachsen [1984] 1 AER 398, which was a freezing order case, Mustill J, as he then was, held at p.404 that this meant,

In the case of Nuttall v NCA [2016] EWHC 1911 (Admin) at paragraph 19, the court said:

The case law further makes clear the court does not assume the statute is fulfilled merely because the NCA, on behalf of the Crown, brings the application. I must also bear in mind the important interests at stake. The following was cited by Edis J from Jennings v Crown Prosecution Service 2006 1 WLR per Laws LJ:

It is important to recognise the reality of these applications. As Mr Mitchell frankly told us, they are always, certainly routinely, made without notice. The reasons are obvious enough. The respondents to such applications are usually charged with, or suspected of, serious crimes involving large sums of money or money's worth. The risk of dissipation will generally speak for itself.

This reality is reflected in Leggett LJ's comment in Re A J, 'In the ordinary case, the prosecution would no doubt be unwise not to proceed ex parte'.

There were further passages that emerged from the case of Simkus, on which reliance was placed by the parties, and I make reference to those cited at paragraph 19 of Simkus, referring also to paragraph 64 in Jennings.

In that case, it was said by Longmore LJ, at 49,

As to the circumstances in which a court does find there has been non-disclosure and the circumstances in which it will discharge an order, Murray J, making reference to the case of Simkus v NCA and Jangbo Hao and Others [2024], EWHC, 2240, set out the following:

The matter was put starkly in NCA v GKC [2020], EWHC, 583, where a complaint of material non-disclosure was made, and Fordham J, referring to Hughes LJ in SFO v A [2000] EWHC, Crim, 1927, said,

The materials relied on by the NCA and the materials upon which Lang J based the property freezing order, were in the witness statement of Mr Daniel Byrne of 19 January 2026. He set out the foundation for the NCA's belief that Mr Jack Moore had been involved in criminal conduct since at least 1 August 2019 when he was appointed the sole director of Timepiece. That statement set out in over 170 paragraphs the detail of the evidence from interviews with associates of Mr Moore, and discrepancies between interview answers and discovered messages between them. Mr Moore gave a no-comment interview and, in a prepared statement later, said his business was legitimate.

Mr Byrne set out the case that Mr Moore had been involved in one major strand of offending, namely money laundering, contrary to the relevant sections of POCA, and this led to secondary strands of offending relating to the failure to register under the Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds Regulations. As set out above, it was believed by the NCA to be a member of a professional money- laundering organisation, providing a range of laundering services using Timepiece. It is described as not itself being involved in the predicate offences, but providing a “laundry service” for third parties' criminal property.

The NCA believed that the operating practices are geared to avoiding the anti-money laundering scrutiny of the regulators. Timepiece is not exclusively engaged in laundering criminal property, it believes, but a proportion of its turnover originates in legitimate watch trading. That is not incompatible with professional money laundering. Indeed, it is part of the way in which it is operated and makes it difficult for the NCA, so he deposes, to distinguish between the legitimate funds and those that are criminal. That aspect, the NCA say, is compounded by poor bookkeeping.

The materials upon which they relied included mobile phone downloads, and the fact the company regularly deals in large volumes of cash. The fact it releases sums to third parties as if they were an informal bank adds strength to that case.

In October 2022, at the time of the raids, the 550 watches on the premises had a value of approximately £7 million. Broadly, this suggested a huge capital investment and also a commercial risk, in terms of insurance and of negative market price fluctuations. The statement sets out in detail the materials obtained following arrest and interview of Mr Moore and a search of Timepiece. A table identified the property subject to the application, which was again, in broad terms, two categories as set out.

The NCA highlighted in their application that Timepiece's primary business account showed a throughput through the account of about £49.5 million from its opening in June 2020 to 17 January 2023. Mr Moore's financial statement showed that £5.9 million was received through credit-card payments and a further bank account during the same period. The NCA set out support for their suspicions of the illegitimate sources and use of the funds, business and property in question. For example, concerning the treatment of cash, this was said:

Mr Byrne also noted as to insurance:

Another point was the running of the commercial risks expressed by Mr Byrne as:

Mr Byrne pointed to evidence also suggesting a system of shadow accounting was pursued, consistent with money laundering. The NCA were also concerned they held evidence that the business knowingly operated without being registered with HMRC under the Money Laundering Regulations.

It was the opinion of NCA that Mr Jack Moore had been involved in unlawful conduct for a significant time. The investigations had been connected to police investigations into large-scale supply of class A and class B controlled drugs and associated money-laundering offences. As well as detailed descriptions of the findings as to financial information and accounts of the respondents, Mr Byrne set out some of the earlier history. It included that, on 3 February 2023, Timepiece had lodged an application under the Police Property Act 1897 for the return of the seized watches. The application was heard on 12 and 13 June 2023 at the City of London Magistrates' Court. The NCA notes Mr Jack Moore did not provide a witness statement. The NCA's senior investigating officer, Mr Brown, gave evidence and was cross-examined. In its judgment, relying on Mr Brown's evidence of 13 June 2023, the district judge dismissed the applicant's claim. A second statement was served, dated 13 February 2026, from Mr Byrne, seeking a variation to the property freezing order to include certain watch boxes and associated paperwork. This was made on notice.

Mr Byrne's third and last statement for this application seeks to explain his understanding of the urgency in seeking the original order and his understanding that, once the decision had been made not to seek a charging decision from the CPS, the NCA was obliged to seek to discharge the restraint order. That would mean the property was returned without delay to the respondents, as he understood it. The NCA had no right to retain it. He deals also with a point made by Mr Daw, KC, today, as he did in court before the district judge, as to not knowing that the physical location of the watches was highly secure and the circumstances of their retention and delayed return.

Rachelle Green of JMW Solicitors, representing Mr Moore and Timepeace, made a statement in support of the respondents application to set aside the freezing order and made a number of points said to cast doubt on the propriety of the order. These arguments were advanced and developed before this court.

Ms Green protested the NCA's failure to realise the complicated and time-consuming arrangements by which the watches in question would come into the possession or control of the respondents. Given these complications, which derived from where they were being kept, they could not have said that the application was urgent. Saying the assets would become available to the respondents ignored the reality of the custody and the control and the logistics. There was necessarily a delay in obtaining the watches and the lack of urgency misled the court into making an ex parte rather than on notice application. Criticism was made of the failure to provide a full explanation as to the decision to proceed no further with criminal proceedings. The criminal investigation, it is pointed out, ran for three years without a charge.

On 13 January 2026, the decision was made that a charging decision would not be sought from the CPS and the applicant moved to civil recovery a few days after that, presenting the without notice application. This was said to be not a lawful basis for bypassing notice.

It was also said an error had been made as to the number of watches originally subject to the restraint order: it was not 550, it was 504. There was a point about the category of watches that had never been claimed, either under the Police Property Act or during the crown court restraint proceedings. In fact, this point was not separately pursued in detail, but it was said to feed into a general more discursive criticism that there were uncertainties at the outset. Indeed, in the evidence they said it showed inadequate preparation and investigation on the part of the NCA.

It was also a matter of criticism that, although mentioned in evidence, the actual sum of cash referred to, just under £200,000, was not included in the property freezing order.

It was also wrong to suggest that receipt of large sums of cash was sinister. That cash had been returned to the respondents, in fact. I note from the evidence that, when the respondents had arranged to collect the cash from the NCA on 30 January 2026, on their return from the collection, they were subject to a hold-up and the cash was stolen in a violent confrontation. The evidence suggests certain individuals were, thereafter, arrested.

Of the objections taken, it was noted, in particular, that there was a personal connection between the senior investigating officer, Mr Brown, now retired, who was involved in the case. He had a family connection with one of the subjects of the investigation. That matter was not disclosed to the judge, and it should have been, and this, it said, fatally undermined the ex parte application. The fact had emerged in vigorous cross-examination by Mr Daw KC at the Westminster Magistrates' Court before District Judge Sternberg. He dealt with the matter in his judgement of 30 June 2023, when Timepiece was seeking return of the watches as noted above.

The oral submissions helpfully reflected in a speaking note, were notionally divided by Mr Daw KC under four headings. His submissions were, however, wide-ranging and generally critical of the nature and content of the evidence and integrity of the civil proceedings of which this order was a part.

The essential questions as heads of challenge were:

As to the first two of these, whether ex parte procedure was justified and non-disclosure, fairness and candour, Mr Daw reminded the court that this case was a case in which it had been determined there was insufficient evidence for the matter to go to the CPS. That, he said, tainted the process. The absence of any criminal charge at the end of the investigation, he characterised as "highly-significant context". The basis for the application was, therefore, he submitted, profoundly unstable.

Insofar as this is a submission that the fact of no criminal charge means the foundation for the civil restraint mechanism is, necessarily, therefore, weak, I reject it. The statutory framework is designed to be a civil mechanism and Parliament's intention is clear under POCA, that the proceeds of crime may, in an appropriate civil context, be frozen.

The respondents argue, further that the matter was not urgent. The watches were kept in secure storage. It would take time to release them from it and it was a serious omission, indeed a misrepresentation on the part of the NCA, not to bring that to the court's attention. This was a real impediment to disposal and dispersal of the property.

Mr Daw KC said the proper approach would have been a meeting between the NCA and the respondents after the determination not to pursue criminal proceedings. There was no perceptible risk shown on the evidence assembled by the NCA at that time. He accused them of a retrospective reconstruction in order to support the original order. Had the court been told of the delay in accessing the physical assets, the watches, they would not have allowed an ex parte application to succeed.

I disagree. The circumstances giving rise to the NCA's concerns were set out at considerable length before Lang J. A flavour of this information is set out, again above from Mr Byrne's statement. Mr Daw KC criticised reliance on the statement that Mr Byrne believed the assets would be dissipated, in that Mr Moore would seek to dispose of assets if they were returned, knowing of the NCA's investigations. He believed – he said it was clear – that they were vulnerable to swift disposal by reason of their nature and presence. This he said was a complete misapprehension. The fact was the actual watches were kept in very secure conditions. This was not mentioned in the NCA's evidence and it should have been known to them. Others, he suggested, in the organisation did know this and did know it made swift dissipation impossible. This was a misrepresentation entirely undermining the case. There was nothing before the court otherwise on dissipation and could not be made out.

There was, in truth, no urgency at all to this application by reason of this factor. The process for removing the watches from secure holding was long and cumbersome and, in fact, had not been completed for some weeks, in the event. The court did not know, and it appears, he said, the NCA did not know, that they were not at large and were not about to disappear.

He said the criminal regime being at an end and the NCA, having moved to the civil recovery regime, assumed the watches would be returned immediately and could be immediately dissipated. Mr Byrne has accepted, as indeed he has in his third statement, that he did not know it and this must mean that section 245A(3) could not have been made out.

Again, I disagree. Mr Byrne was certainly concerned about physical dissipation of the watches. In my judgement, however, it is clear that, as a matter of common sense with a commodity such as watches, their use is not merely as an item of which possession may physically be given. Their availability to be disposed of to third parties without moving is perfectly clear.

The point is that restrictions on transfer after discharge of the restraint order and immediately were necessary until further order of the court in the terms of this PFO. As Mr Conway stated, on behalf of the NCA, by reference to the case of Costello v Chief Constable of Derbyshire, [2000] EWCA 381, and The King v Seed [ 2021 EWCA Crim 1198, the NCA had no right to possession or retention otherwise. The estimated value was significant, at approximately £2.4 million, and would have been available for security or could have been sold to a third party wherever it was. An action for the property's return could also have claimed the property. Lawful custody following discharge of the restraint order was an issue at the time of the application. It was known that without a protective order, the property could be sold and or its ownership transferred.

The NCA draws attention to Mr Byrne's third statement where he reflects his understanding that, once the Senior Investigating Officer had decided not to seek a charging decision from the CPS, the CPS was duty bound to seek discharge of the restraint order over the property. On 16 January, shortly thereafter, the case became adopted for civil recovery investigation. It was on the 19^th that the application for the urgent order was made on an ex parte basis.

The property in question, valued at about £2.4 million, would have been available to be sold or offered as security for lending or could have been required to be returned by court action he stated.

I accept that Mr Byrne, in his first statement in support of the ex parte order, is likely dealing expressly with the fear of physical dissipation of the property, in light of the imminent end to the restraining order, in circumstances where he believed the property was the proceeds of crime. In his recent statement, he states, and I accept, had he known it would take time for the watches to be released from secure custody, he would, nonetheless, have been concerned that the retention of the material had not been secured, and there was no legal right in the NCA to its possession. If he had known about it, he would have drawn the fact of the process to the court's attention and he would still have considered the application should be made ex parte, because of the property remaining at risk. In my judgement, it is fanciful, as a matter of common sense, in the context of this case and the evidence on which the NCA relied before Lang J, to say that the property would not be at risk of dissipation once the respondents were free to deal with it as owners, whether they were in physical possession or not.

The evidence Mr Byrne had put before the court of the quasi-banker role alleged to have been played by Mr Moore with the use of his business and his associates, and the nature and value of the property and sophistication of the alleged operation, were such as to make this an obvious corollary of their activities. The skeleton argument of the NCA before the court in January did mention the risk of dissipation in more general terms.

Further, I accept, as Mr Conway, on behalf of the NCA states, that there is evidence in the papers that the respondents had been involved in the sale and purchase of the watches that were in the police's physical possession. Although technically the property was under the custody and control of the police, title and ownership were capable of being transferred at that time and there was evidence that it was transferred. Without a restraint order or a PFO, such transfer was possible. Despite it being under custody and control, the respondents had transferred title and ownership of a number of watches from third-party owners to the second respondent. This, as the NCA says, shows the respondents were willing and able to trade watches that had been seized by the police, not in their own possession and subject to ongoing criminal investigation.

I also accept, as is argued by the NCA, that, if property had been transferred to a third party, the complication and expense of tracing such property afterwards and the proceeds of sale would have been very significant, and would have prejudiced the right of the NCA to obtain a recovery order, (see section 245A(3). The court would have had that section in mind: it was expressly mentioned in the application.

I do not accept, as suggested, there is any impermissible change of tack or failure in the NCA. The order was properly made ex parte, in light of the materials relied upon. It is wholly unrealistic, in my view, to suggest that a meeting, discussion and on-notice application was a viable alternative, consistent with the NCA's duties under statute.

I bear in mind that, as a foundation for an ex parte order of this nature in civil forfeiture cases in this context, inference plays, or may properly play, a significant part. It is trite that unlawful conduct can be proved by inference from indirect evidence. In the present context – that is also the case, as held by Sweeney J in SOCA v Agidi [2011], EWHC 175 – the following was said:

There was a strong case here on the facts deposed to by Mr Byrne. Without applying on an urgent ex parte basis, the NCA would have been prejudiced in obtaining a recovery order. I do not regard there to have been any non-disclosure, as argued. The fact that Mr Byrne was ignorant of the problems of physical custody of the property and delay is irrelevant to the propriety of the order.

Similarly, it is suggested there was a material non-disclosure concerning allegations regarding Mr Brown, the NCA officer, when Timepeace and Mr Moore were seeking the return of their property in the other forum. The former officer was cross-examined by Mr Daw KC about the fact of his connections to the subjects of the investigation, as set out above. The allegation was this was a taint on the investigation and the failure of Mr Byrne to deal with this was fatal and a serious flaw in the ex parte case. It is said by Mr Daw KC that Mr Byrne was obliged to deal with this.

I disagree as to the import of this information. This was not, on the evidence before this court, a matter that affected the integrity of the enquiry or its outcome in any way. It was ventilated in strong terms before the district judge on behalf of the respondents (who were then the applicants). The fact of Mr Byrne's involvement made no difference to the hearing or its outcome, although it was considered fully by the district judge with respect to the integrity of the investigation then on foot. I agree with Mr Daw KC that it probably should have been mentioned, if only to alert the court to a matter the respondents would likely wish to mention, but it is far from a material or relevant point that undermined the investigation, the case itself or the application.

Mr Byrne has since explained that he knew this officer had been cross-examined before the district judge, having read a paragraph in a witness statement made in support of the original restraint order application. Mr Byrne explains he does not understand how that point dealt with in 2023 was material in the present matter. It did not inform consideration of the freezing order or make any difference to the material facts in his estimation. There was no further information forthcoming when, later, enquiries were made of the professional standards unit. He noted what had been said, but also that the magistrates' court had made the restraint order in any event, and he, having read the judgment in those proceedings of District Judge Sternberg, noted the magistrates' court dismissed the concerns as not material. They relied upon and accepted Mr Brown's evidence.

I have indicated, the inclusion of the fact of the challenge would have been better, but as I have also said, the omission is very far, indeed, from impugning the basis on which the order was applied for or made.

The facts were that Mr Brown had not mentioned his personal connection with a Mr Henderson, who had an association with Timepiece. He did not mention that his brother-in-law had asked him for assistance in retrieving a watch which had been seized by the NCA in the investigation. Mr Brown told his brother-in-law it was not a good idea for his son, that is Mr Brown's nephew, to take proposed employment at Watch Trader. The position was characterised by the district judge as failures of omission and not an attempt to conceal the true position. The contact with the brother-in-law had been reported to the operational security advisor and a line manager at the NCA. There were some relevant WhatsApp messages, but these had not been seen by Mr Brown. The district judge said it would have been better if the matters had been openly set out, but the failure to disclose was not deliberate in any sense.

I remind myself also that, in the case of Simkus, where there was inadvertent non-disclosure, said by the judge there to be a serious matter, the order was, nonetheless, maintained (see paragraphs 114 to 116).

Mr Daw suggested that Mr Byrne's evidence did not grapple with the history in a meaningful or appropriately balanced manner. The account was not complete. It did not provide, "a property-specific explanation for retaining certain of the watches in distinction to those that had been not retained". The alleged inaccuracies, he said, meant there was no proper merit base for maintaining the order. Attention was drawn to the fact that there was a significant retail business in place with large trading volumes. The fact that there was no charging decision, again, he said, was highly significant context.

I disagree. The basis on which the order was obtained was clearly supported by the materials from Mr Byrne and reasonable inferences drawn from the findings of the investigation to date. Necessarily, in such a context as this, where the civil mechanism is used, it may be said that the agencies and authorities were not in a position to be sure to the criminal standard of the matters upon which they relied as proving criminal activity. This does not undermine what was, in my judgment, a careful and sustainable case to the standards set out earlier in this judgment.

The history is described as "selective". The background here was, necessarily, complex, but, in my judgment, the facts, as they were understood, were clearly and sufficiently set out.

Further, as is pointed out by Mr Conway, there was no sworn evidence at all by way of explanation, contrary analysis or elucidation from Mr Moore. Complaint is made that some 1,000 pages of underlying source material is not exhibited or explained in more detail. "Related contextual matters" were not exposed and some of the assumptions used were not certain at the time the court was invited to make an order. In my judgment, these matters are an inevitable corollary of a complex investigation into likely sophisticated multifaceted probably fraudulent activities. The standards of a good arguable case are clear and they were met in this case. The points of detail and contentions raised in this part of the argument are, as characterised by Mr Conway, matters for trial.

There has been disagreement as to the status of watches which were said not to have been claimed. Although Mr Daw KC stated in his speaking notes this was not a mini-trial on each of the individual watches, in my judgment, this category of criticism came close to that. The fact there may have been some provable errors as to certain of the items is nothing to the point in the context of the materials that were set out, a flavour of which appears above.

It is suggested that the matter is far too complex for a without notice paper application. I disagree that the complexity has been misunderstood or misrepresented by the NCA and complexity on its own is far from being a reason for not applying for an ex parte order.

Complaint is made about the treatment of £200,000 in cash. It was submitted to be a significant plank of NCA's case, or at least it was mentioned as significant in the evidence before the court, that this money had, in the event, been returned to the respondents and that should have been highlighted as it undercut their case. In fact, the approximately £200,000 mentioned above was not referred to the civil recovery team and not considered before the application for the property freezing order and found no part in it. It had been returned, in fact, by 30 January.

I do not accept the fact the cash was returned in some way undermines the allegation of criminality based on the materials I have set out above.

The circumstances were wholly consistent with the operation of a money-laundering process, as were the other materials relied upon. I reject the submission made on several occasions by Mr Daw KC that the application was some how advanced first then properly worked through afterwards. This is a complete mischaracterisation, in my judgment.

Forcefully, though the submissions were made orall, and also by way of helpful skeleton argument and speaking notes. I am compelled to reject them.

I accept the ex parte process was properly entered and properly supported by evidence. In the circumstances of this case, the ex parte application was necessary. Such differences in changes to, or reconsideration of, parts of the material over the course of time does not impugn that judgment.

It was further said there was no consideration of rights arising under Article 1, Protocol I ECHR: in other words it suggested proportionality was never considered. That is not the case. It was set out in the skeleton argument before the court on the ex parte application.

Certain other complaints were made about value but, in fact, as Mr Conway indicated, the minimum statutory value statement had been met and asserted as met and the schedule was referred to.

It was also asserted that there ought to have been formal valuation. Again, in the context of this application and the materials exhibited and explained, there was no defect of detail in my judgement. My job here is to give appropriate deference to the evaluation carried out by Lang J but also to review the matters afresh. I am wholly clear the order was properly sought and granted before Lang J on the material available. I have considered that material. It is clear to me the order should continue in the manner she set out and for the time she determined.

The application must fail.