Karen Chang will serve as the SFO's director and chief executive for the next four years
FMA acting GC Karen Chang has been appointed to lead the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) as director and chief executive for a four-year term.
According to Deputy Public Service Commissioner Helene Quilter, Chang will replace Julie Read, who has been at the helm of the SFO since 2013, effective 26 April. Quilter said that Chang possessed a clear vision regarding the SFO’s role and its future positioning.
“I’m very pleased to appoint Ms. Chang to this important role,” Quilter said. “Ms. Chang is a proven leader in the field of financial crime law enforcement and has worked closely with the SFO on a number of investigations.”
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Chang has been the FMA’s acting GC since November 2021. In this role, she helmed the policy and governance, corporate legal, investigations and enforcement functions for the government agency, which is responsible for regulation of financial markets across the country.
In 2017, she was appointed the agency’s head of enforcement head, leading complex, high-profile criminal and civil cases such as criminal prosecutions involving investor fraud, insider trading and Ponzi schemes and civil pecuniary proceedings for breach of capital markets trading misconduct.
Prior to her stint at the FMA, Chang was a senior Crown prosecutor at Meredith Connell, where she prosecuted a wide range of criminal trials concerning fraud, theft and financial reporting offences on behalf of the FMA and the SFO.