A man has been arrested as part of an investigation into a million pound money laundering and fraud ring.

The 57-year-old from Thornton Heath, who has not been named, was one of 10 arrested by the Metropolitan Police’s Money Laundering team as part of Operation Snare.

During the early morning raids, a total of eight search warrants were carried out across London, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire. Officers seized a number of items including financial correspondence, cash and computers.

The raids were intelligence led and are linked to Operation Rize, an investigation by the Metropolitan Police dating back to June 2008 into three safety depositories and their suspected use by organised criminal networks.

As part of the safety depositories investigation, officers found a number of boxes, all believed to be linked, that were packed with cash.

The total cash value of the boxes was approximately three quarters of a million pounds.

Further financial investigations suggested the individuals linked to these boxes had been making significant fraudulent benefit claims. The benefits being claimed were mainly income support and housing benefit, believed to be up to a total value of approximately £200,000.

Detective Inspector Steve Willcox from the Met's Money Laundering Team said: "This is another excellent result for Operation Rize.

"The hard work continues by the Metropolitan Police to ensure that all those who sought to use these safety deposit facilities as a way to hide illegal activity or ill gotten gains are brought to justice.

"We are committed to taking the cash out of crime and investigating those criminals who seek to abuse the system."

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