Before the mid-1980's, there was little attention paid to the investigation of serious fraud. While there were two early fraud trials in New Zealand, no real forensic awareness of the phenomenon arose in the country until the 1970's. While the Justice Department created a Commercial Affairs Division in 1972, it had no mandate to bring charges on its own and cases involving suspected criminal activity were generally passed onto the police. Following the notorious JBL case in the mid- 1970's, the police and justice departments began to cooperate on serious commercial fraud. With the increasing realization of the magnitude of, and damaged caused by, white collar crime, the government established the Corporate Fraud Unit (CFU) in 1985. However, lack of funding and resources made the unit's failure in terms of prosecuting criminals inevitable. The government has responded to the inadequacies of the CFU and the need to prosecute vigorously the high level of serious fraud; the New Zealand Serious Fraud Office, set up in 1990, has special powers, is directly answerable to Parliament, and is independent of both the police and the Justice Department. 16 references