White Collar

  • June 07, 2023

    6 Charged In $15M Pandemic Relief Loan Fraud

    New York federal prosecutors have charged six people with attempting to scam the government out of nearly $15 million in COVID-19 relief funds, according to a complaint unsealed Tuesday.

  • June 07, 2023

    Venezuela Bribe Charges Tossed Over 'Intentional' Trial Delays

    A Portuguese man indicted in relation to the U.S. government's investigation into alleged bribery at the Venezuelan state-owned Petróleos de Venezuela SA oil company had his charges dismissed with prejudice by a Texas federal judge who agreed that prosecutors had intentionally caused delays in his case.

  • June 06, 2023

    Coinbase's Court Fight With SEC May Be Crypto's Main Event

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's lawsuit against Coinbase is poised to be the crypto industry's landmark case over whether digital asset exchange activity runs afoul of securities laws, and it could become the industry's full-court press to reach the high court.

  • June 06, 2023

    Kwok Trustee Says Daughter, Biz Interfered With $37M Escrow

    An admittedly "upset" Chapter 11 trustee on Tuesday accused both the daughter of Chinese exile Ho Wan Kwok and her affiliated company in Connecticut bankruptcy court of standing between him and a $37 million escrow funding that a judge determined belonged to Kwok's sprawling bankruptcy estate.

  • June 06, 2023

    Coinbase, Binance Bring Out BigLaw Guns For SEC Defense

    When the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission escalated its crackdown on the digital assets industry this week by suing Coinbase and Binance, the cryptocurrency exchanges showed they were geared up for a fight by hiring some of the most well-known securities and white collar defense lawyers from firms such as WilmerHale and Latham.  

  • June 06, 2023

    Banking Groups Say SEC Cybersecurity Proposals Too Strict

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission received a range of feedback from industry stakeholders on the comment deadline for two of the agency's cybersecurity rule proposals, with major banking industry groups saying they are too prescriptive and a banking reform group calling for tougher provisions.

  • June 06, 2023

    Biz Owner Paid Bribes In Bid For Lawmakers' Help, Jury Hears

    A sweepstakes machine business owner bribed two Illinois lawmakers with checks to secure their influence in passing industry-related legislation and then lied about it to the FBI, a federal jury heard Tuesday.

  • June 06, 2023

    'Inventing Anna' Scammer's Ex-Atty Says She Owes $153K

    Anna Sorokin, a convicted scammer who became the subject of the popular Netflix series "Inventing Anna," has been sued in New York state court by her former and now-disbarred attorney on claims that she owes about $153,000 for unpaid legal services.

  • June 06, 2023

    Wash. Rancher Agrees To $1M Fine In 'Ghost Cattle' Scam

    A Washington cattle rancher sentenced to 11 years in prison for defrauding Tyson Foods and another company out of more than $244 million in a "ghost cattle" scam has agreed to pay $1 million to settle claims he violated the Commodity Exchange Act in relation to the Chicago Mercantile Exchange cattle futures market.

  • June 06, 2023

    Trump Challenges Carroll's $10M Defamation Amendment

    E. Jean Carroll shouldn't be allowed to amend her defamation suit over Donald Trump's denials of her decades-old dressing room rape accusation, the former president told a Manhattan federal judge Monday, arguing that she's trying to improperly retrofit her complaint to leverage a jury's recent verdict finding him liable for sexually abusing her.

  • June 06, 2023

    Yearlong Breach Probe Puts SEC In Businesses' Shoes

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's yearlong investigation revealing that an in-house data breach had a far deeper impact than previously believed could give the agency — which is finalizing closely watched new cyber incident reporting rules — insight into the challenges faced by cyberattack victims.

  • June 06, 2023

    Bannon Ally Guo Wengui Headed For 2024 $1B Fraud Trial

    A New York federal judge on Tuesday set a spring 2024 trial date for exiled Chinese businessman Guo Wengui, who's accused of a multifaceted $1 billion fraud scheme that conned investors in a media company he founded with former Donald Trump adviser Steve Bannon.

  • June 06, 2023

    SEC Moves For Emergency Freeze Of Binance Assets

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission moved Tuesday evening to freeze the U.S. assets of Binance post-haste in what it says is an effort to protect customer assets while it pursues a lawsuit claiming that the world's largest crypto platform mishandled customer funds and deceived regulators.

  • June 06, 2023

    Ga. Banker Org's Ex-Accountant Charged With Embezzlement

    A former accountant for the Georgia Bankers Association plans to plead guilty to accusations that he embezzled $700,000 from the trust that the organization used to offer insurance plans to its members.

  • June 06, 2023

    Conn. US Atty On The Value Of Corporate Self-Disclosure

    As a former litigation attorney in private practice, U.S. Attorney Vanessa Roberts Avery understands the value of a new U.S. Department of Justice carrot-and-stick approach that rewards corporations for confessing their legal sins with a measure of leniency, she told Law360 in a recent wide-ranging interview.

  • June 06, 2023

    NY Panel Wary Of Trump's Bid To Toss AG's $250M Fraud Suit

    A New York state appellate panel expressed skepticism Tuesday about Donald Trump's core argument that Attorney General Letitia James lacks the authority to sue him for defrauding banks and insurers that have not complained, even as it indicated that it might let his daughter Ivanka slip away.

  • June 06, 2023

    4th Circ. Won't Rehear Bump-Up Exclusion Ruling

    The Fourth Circuit rejected Towers Watson's request Tuesday to rethink its decision that a bump-up exclusion under a directors and officers policy applies to the so-called reverse triangular merger between it and Willis Group Holdings PLC in 2016.

  • June 06, 2023

    Case Against Takeda, Eli Lilly Gets Partial Class Cert.

    A California federal judge has certified a class of at least hundreds of third-party payors who ponied up money for anti-diabetes drug Actos as part of a suit accusing Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. and Eli Lilly & Co. of hiding the risks associated with the treatment.

  • June 06, 2023

    Fla. Man Admits Trafficking Counterfeit Cisco Devices

    A Florida man charged with selling $1 billion worth of counterfeit and broken Cisco networking equipment pled guilty in New Jersey federal court Monday to fraud and trafficking conspiracy charges.

  • June 06, 2023

    George Santos Bail Co-Signers Should Be Public, Judge Says

    A federal magistrate judge sided with media organizations on Tuesday in ruling that the identities of the bond co-signers for U.S. Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., should be made public while he fights fraud charges, but kept the names sealed to allow for an appeal.

  • June 06, 2023

    Fate Execs Sued After $50M Deal With J&J Unit Falls Apart

    Executives of biopharmaceutical company Fate Therapeutics Inc. have been hit with a shareholder derivative suit alleging they misled investors about the feasibility of a $50 million collaboration agreement with a Johnson & Johnson unit, leading to a stock price decline when the agreement was later terminated.

  • June 06, 2023

    Wellness Execs Charged With Sex Cult 'Forced Labor' Scheme

    Two former executives of sexual wellness company OneTaste Inc. were charged by federal prosecutors with obtaining labor from volunteers and employees through various forms of psychological manipulation.

  • June 06, 2023

    Special Master Eyes Sept. Launch Date For Citgo Auction

    The special master overseeing an impending auction for energy giant Citgo wants a federal judge to kick-start the sale process in late September, accusing Venezuela and its state-owned oil regime of voicing objections that "are all recycled and have long been addressed by the court."

  • June 06, 2023

    Legal Ethicists Back Inmate's Innocence Case At High Court

    A group of renowned legal ethics scholars has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case of an Oklahoma death row inmate whose murder conviction has been deemed by the state's attorney general to be plagued by errors and possible prosecutorial misconduct, court filings show.

  • June 06, 2023

    UK Watchdog Doubles Cartel Whistleblower Rewards

    British antitrust enforcers will now offer rewards of up to £250,000 ($310,000) to people who share information about unlawful cartel activity, the Competition and Markets Authority said Tuesday.

Expert Analysis

  • A Brief Primer On Using Web-Archived Evidence

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    Because the temporal dimensions of web content — i.e., what appeared online, and when — are increasingly critical to all kinds of claims, attorneys should understand how web archives can be used to furnish key evidence, as well as strategies for admitting and authenticating such evidence in court, says Nicholas Taylor at the Los Alamos National Laboratory Research Library.

  • Opinion

    AUSA Jobs Don't Pay Enough To Keep Staff, Attract Diversity

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    Assistant U.S. attorneys earn significantly less than their U.S. Department of Justice counterparts, resulting in urgent recruitment and retention issues that hurt the federal administration of justice, and must be addressed by fairly compensating AUSAs, says Steven Wasserman, president of the National Association of U.S. Attorneys.

  • Tackling Judge-Shopping Concerns While Honoring Localism

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    As the debate continues over judge-shopping and case assignments in federal court, policymakers should look to a hybrid model that preserves the benefits of localism for those cases that warrant it, while preventing the appearance of judge-shopping for cases of a more national or widespread character, says Joshua Sohn at the U.S. Department of Justice.

  • Peeling Back The Layers Of Rep. George Santos' Indictment

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    Federal prosecutors' recent 13-count criminal indictment of Rep. George Santos reflects a focused, even simplified approach, showing the kind of careful scrutiny that charges against sitting members of Congress always merit, and leaving open questions about potential charges other enforcers could bring, say Rob Walker and Caleb Burns at Wiley.

  • No Easy Out For FCA Defendants After Justices' Ruling

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    The U.S. Supreme Court’s June 1 decision in U.S. v. SuperValu puts an end to the defense that a federal contractor's belief and in-house debates about problematic conduct are irrelevant to False Claims Act liability, says R. Scott Oswald at The Employment Law Group.

  • After The Bank Failures: Where Regulators Are Headed Next

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    In the concluding installment of a two-part series reviewing the preliminary congressional and regulatory responses to the 2023 bank failures, Gordon Bava at Manatt breaks down policy and management deficiencies within the agencies that are revealed in a series of key agency reports.

  • SEC Actions Show Tough Crypto Stance So Far This Year

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    Through the first half of 2023, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has reiterated innovative arguments and heftier penalties within the cryptocurrency enforcement landscape, emphasizing its position that crypto assets are securities and thus under its jurisdiction, say attorneys at Willkie.

  • Perspectives

    How Attorneys Can Help Combat Anti-Asian Hate

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    Amid an exponential increase in violence against Asian American and Pacific Islander communities, unique obstacles stand in the way of accountability and justice — but lawyers can effect powerful change by raising awareness, offering legal representation, advocating for victims’ rights and more, say attorneys at Gibson Dunn.

  • Opinion

    Congress Needs To Enact A Federal Anti-SLAPP Statute

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    Although many states have passed statutes meant to prevent individuals or entities from filing strategic lawsuits against public participation, other states have not, so it's time for Congress to enact a federal statute to ensure that free speech and petitioning rights are uniformly protected nationwide in federal court, say attorneys at Skadden.

  • 5 Insider-Threat Reminders After Recent DOJ Prosecutions

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    Three recent U.S. Department of Justice actions may well lead to much greater scrutiny of companies in which insiders engage in a variety of corporate misconduct, including conducting or enabling cybercrimes, which will likely fall not just on government contractors, but across industries and geographies, say attorneys at Paul Weiss.

  • Dealing With Dogmatic Jurors: Voir Dire And Trial Strategies

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    Dogmatic jurors — whose rigid reliance on external authority can inhibit accurate, objective decision making — may be both good and bad for plaintiffs and defense counsel, so attorneys should understand how to identify such jurors in voir dire and how to meet them where they are during trial, say consultants at Courtroom Sciences.

  • FCA Can Be An Effective Tool For Fighting Customs Fraud

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    Appeals pending before the U.S. Supreme Court and Ninth Circuit may affect the scienter and jurisdictional aspects of False Claims Act cases alleging customs fraud, which can provide an avenue to alert U.S. Customs and Border Protection and potentially help clients to recover losses from unfair competitors, say Ellen London at London & Stout and former Assistant U.S. Attorney Li Yu.

  • How The US And UK Differ On Crypto Regulation

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    While the U.K. and U.S. share strong economic ties, their approaches to crypto regulation differ wildly, with the U.K. setting bespoke rules through legislation and the U.S. taking a fragmented, and arguably hostile, approach to regulating crypto-assets, most often happening through enforcement, say attorneys at BCLP.

  • Some Client Speculations On AI And The Law Firm Biz Model

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    Generative artificial intelligence technologies will put pressure on the business of law as it is structured currently, but clients may end up with more price certainty for legal services, and lawyers may spend more time being lawyers, says Jonathan Cole at Melody Capital.

  • Shkreli Cos. Bankruptcy Illustrates Novel Subchapter V Trend

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    Vyera Pharmaceuticals and related companies founded by convicted "Pharma Bro" Martin Shkreli recently filed for bankruptcy under Subchapter V in Delaware, becoming the latest case to show the appeal of the subchapter for debtors with large contingent or unliquidated liabilities seeking a more efficient form of bankruptcy, says Sam Ashuraey at Paul Hastings.

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