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White Collar
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July 12, 2024
Reservist Found Guilty Of Taking Bribes For Visa Letters
A U.S. Navy Reserve officer was found guilty in New Hampshire federal court on Friday of accepting bribes from Afghan nationals seeking recommendations for special immigrant visas, green cards reserved for individuals who assist the U.S. military.
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July 12, 2024
Off The Bench: NCAA Loses, Favre Wobbles, NFL Fights Back
In this week's Off The Bench, the Third Circuit enlivens the debate over whether college athletes can be considered employees, the Fifth Circuit is skeptical of Brett Favre's defamation suit and the NFL disputes claims of racism.
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July 12, 2024
Menendez Bribery Case Goes To Jury
A Manhattan jury began deliberating Friday over bribery and other charges against Sen. Robert Menendez and two New Jersey businessmen after hearing hours of instructions in the 18-count case and eating their final lunch with five alternates.
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July 12, 2024
Guo Trial Juror Booted For Googling Fugitive Co-Defendant
The jury in Chinese dissident Miles Guo's $1 billion fraud and racketeering case was forced to restart its verdict deliberations on Friday after a juror was cut loose for Google-searching Guo's fugitive financial adviser and co-defendant William Je.
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July 12, 2024
Giuliani's Ch. 11 Tossed Over Lack Of Financial Candor
Rudolph W. Giuliani, former mayor of New York City and legal adviser to Donald Trump, had his Chapter 11 case dismissed Friday by a New York bankruptcy judge, who found that Giuliani's missing financial disclosure made ending the proceedings the best option for creditors.
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July 12, 2024
Ex-Slync CEO Gets 20 Years After Wire Fraud Conviction
The founder of shuttered supply chain management software company Slync has received a 20-year prison sentence involving a pair of partially concurrent sentences after a Texas jury in January handed down convictions on wire fraud and other claims over prosecutors' allegations that he drained $25 million out of his company's bank accounts.
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July 12, 2024
Ga. Jury Convicts Men For Ready-Mix Concrete Conspiracy
A Georgia federal jury convicted two men for their roles in a years-long scheme to fix prices and rig bids for tens of millions of dollars of ready-mix concrete in the greater Savannah area.
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July 12, 2024
Feds Say Fake Gunshot Wounds Part Of $1M Fraud Scheme
Five Massachusetts residents and one New Yorker defrauded insurance companies out of more than $1 million by submitting reimbursement claims for bogus overseas medical expenses, including gunshot wounds, stabbings and car accidents, federal prosecutors announced on Friday.
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July 12, 2024
Package Plea Deals Need More Scrutiny, Mich. Justices Say
The Michigan Supreme Court said Friday that package plea bargains deserve more analysis due to the potential for co-defendants to pressure each other into taking a deal, with two justices sharply dissenting and cautioning the decision would increase trial court workloads and discourage prosecutors from offering deals.
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July 12, 2024
Midyear Report: Taking Stock Of Sports Betting Enforcement
The first six months of 2024 saw no shortage of action in the enforcement of sports betting rules, highlighted by a bombshell fraud case ensnaring baseball's biggest star and a messy betting scandal that saw a fringe NBA rotation player banned from the game for life.
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July 12, 2024
Feds Seek 2 Years For Mass. Atty In Campaign Finance Scam
Boston federal prosecutors want a former BigLaw attorney to serve two years in prison for his conviction for a raft of campaign finance violations tied to his 2018 run for an open congressional seat in Massachusetts.
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July 12, 2024
Ex-DOJ Atty Clark Can't Move Ethics Case To Federal Court
A D.C. Circuit panel on Friday threw out a bid from former Trump administration lawyer Jeffrey Clark to transfer his attorney discipline case to federal court, saying the embattled attorney attempted to remove the ethics charges too late.
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July 12, 2024
Ex-Ga. Insurance Chief Gets 3½ Years For Kickback Scheme
John Oxendine, the former four-term Georgia insurance commissioner who pled guilty this year to working with a doctor to run a multimillion-dollar medical testing kickback scheme, was hit with a 3½-year prison sentence by a Georgia federal judge Friday.
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July 12, 2024
Former City Treasurer Gets 30 Months In $1M Embezzlement
A former city treasurer in Alaska was sentenced to two and a half years in prison after having admitted to tax evasion and fraud in connection with a $1 million embezzlement scheme, according to Alaska federal court documents.
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July 12, 2024
Ex-Magellan Execs Waive Conflicts Over Past Shared Counsel
Two former Magellan Diagnostics executives charged with conspiring to hide defects in the company's lead testing devices agreed on Friday to waive any potential conflict created by their prior joint representation by a Donnelly Conroy & Gelhaar LLP attorney.
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July 12, 2024
'Willful Withholding' Of Evidence Dooms Baldwin 'Rust' Case
Alec Baldwin wept and hugged his attorneys Friday after a New Mexico state judge threw out involuntary manslaughter charges against the actor in the "Rust" shooting case, finding that prosecutors willfully withheld key ammunition evidence from the defense.
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July 12, 2024
CFTC, DOJ Convene 'Pig Butchering' Working Group
The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission and a U.S. Department of Justice cryptocurrency enforcement team have convened a working group focused on crypto fraud scams known as "pig butchering" schemes, joining forces with officials from more than 15 federal agencies.
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July 12, 2024
Biggest Illinois Decisions Of 2024: A Midyear Report
State and federal courts have handed down rulings so far this year that limited the reach of a federal bribery law commonly used to prosecute Illinois corruption, laid out a framework to challenge so-called mootness fees and clarified the scope of Illinois defamation and antitrust law. Here's a look at some of the biggest Illinois decisions in the first half of 2024.
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July 11, 2024
Trump Says Immunity Ruling Means Conviction Must Be Axed
Donald Trump has officially lodged his request for his conviction to be vacated in light of the U.S. Supreme Court's presidential immunity decision, arguing that prosecutors' evidence in the hush money case rests on official acts he took as president, according to a redacted motion made public Thursday.
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July 11, 2024
Whispers, Curses As Menendez Trial Inches Toward Jury
Federal corruption prosecutors wound down their bribery case against Sen. Robert Menendez Thursday with a mixture of dramatic into-the-mic whispering and reliance on the adjective "damn" as they argued that nothing in the tale would make sense without the alchemizing element of crime.
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July 11, 2024
2nd Circ. Backs Disbarred Atty's Prison Term For Fraud Plea
A disbarred California attorney can't reverse a Manhattan federal court's 5½-year prison sentence and $5.5 million restitution order that followed his guilty plea to wire fraud for a real estate and venture fraud scheme, the Second Circuit ruled Thursday.
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July 11, 2024
Colo. Panel Rejects 3rd Party Shields To Anti-Influencing Law
A Colorado law criminalizing attempts to influence public servants doesn't require an offender to personally influence the official "by means of deceit," a state appellate panel ruled Thursday, holding for the first time that a person can be liable for engaging in a plan of deception with a third party.
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July 11, 2024
Biden Taps Warren Protege, Ex-CFPB Atty For CFTC Seat
President Joe Biden on Thursday nominated a senior Office of Management and Budget official and former Consumer Financial Protection Bureau attorney to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission to replace one of two current CFTC members who themselves have been nominated for other offices.
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July 11, 2024
Ozy Media CEO Urges Jury To Reject 'Shady' Fraud Case
Counsel for Carlos Watson on Thursday told a Brooklyn federal jury not to trust prosecutors' "shady" claims that the Ozy Media founder and CEO defrauded lenders and investors by falsely inflating the news and entertainment startup's bottom line.
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July 11, 2024
Texas AG Claims He's About To Be Impeached Again
In a social media post about an upcoming Texas House committee meeting, Attorney General Ken Paxton said "weak-kneed" establishment Republicans and Democrats are conspiring on a second impeachment effort to try to remove him from office — a claim the committee chair called "farfetched fantasy."
Expert Analysis
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Perspectives
Compassionate Release Grants Needed Now More Than Ever
After the U.S. Sentencing Commission's recent expansion of the criteria for determining compassionate release eligibility, courts should grant such motions more frequently in light of the inherently dangerous conditions presented by increasingly understaffed and overpopulated federal prisons, say Alan Ellis and Mark Allenbaugh at the Law Offices of Alan Ellis.
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Communication Is Key As CFPB Updates Appeals Process
Though a recently updated Consumer Financial Protection Bureau rule expands financial institutions' abilities to appeal supervisory decisions, creating strong relationships and open communication channels with CFPB examiners may help resolve disputes faster than the more cumbersome formal process, says Jason McElroy at Saul Ewing.
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Unpacking The New Russia Sanctions And Export Controls
Although geographically broad new prohibitions the U.S., U.K. and EU issued last week are somewhat underwhelming in their efforts to target third-country facilitators of Russia sanctions evasion, companies with exposure to noncompliant jurisdictions should pay close attention to their potential impacts, say attorneys at Shearman.
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Mitigating Whistleblower Risks After High Court UBS Ruling
While it is always good practice for companies to periodically review whistleblower trainings, policies and procedures, the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent whistleblower-friendly ruling in Murray v. UBS Securities helps demonstrate their importance in reducing litigation risk, say attorneys at Arnold & Porter.
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Perspectives
Justices' Double Jeopardy Ruling Preserves Acquittal Sanctity
The U.S. Supreme Court’s unanimous decision last week in McElrath v. Georgia, barring the state from retrying a man acquitted of murder after a so-called repugnant verdict, is significant in the tangled web of double jeopardy jurisprudence for its brief and unequivocal protection of an acquittal’s finality, says Lissa Griffin at Pace Law School.
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Steps For Companies New To Sanctions Compliance
Businesses newly required to implement compliance programs due to the increased breadth of mandatory sanctions and export controls, including 500 additional Russia sanctions announced last Friday, should closely follow the guidance issued by the Office of Foreign Assets Control and other regulators, say Jennifer Schubert and Megan Church at MoloLamken.
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Bank Secrecy Act Lessons For Casinos After DOJ Settlements
The U.S. Department of Justice's recent settlements with the MGM Grand and Cosmopolitan casinos, resolving an investigation into alleged violations of the Bank Secrecy Act, signal a shift in the DOJ's enforcement focus and provide insight into potential pitfalls in anti-money laundering compliance programs, say attorneys at Jenner & Block.
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High Court Forfeiture Case Again Pits Text Against Purpose
In oral arguments Tuesday in McIntosh v. U.S., the U.S. Supreme Court will consider whether a federal court can impose asset forfeiture on a defendant even if it doesn’t comply with timing rules, which may affect the broader interpretation of procedural deadlines — and tees up the latest battle between textualism and purposivism, say Anden Chow and Christian Bale at MoloLamken.
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6 Pointers For Attys To Build Trust, Credibility On Social Media
In an era of information overload, attorneys can use social media strategically — from making infographics to leveraging targeted advertising — to cut through the noise and establish a reputation among current and potential clients, says Marly Broudie at SocialEyes Communications.
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Cos. Must Know How NY, Federal LLC Disclosure Laws Differ
Though New York state's new LLC Transparency Act and the federal Corporate Transparency Act impose similar beneficial owner reporting obligations on limited liability companies, New York LLCs should study the important differences between the laws to ensure they are prepared to comply with both, say Abram Ellis, Olenka Burghardt and Jane Jho at Simpson Thacher.
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More Than Drugs At Stake In High Court's 'Blind Mule' Case
The U.S. Supreme Court's eventual decision in Diaz v. U.S., evaluating whether expert witnesses may testify that most defendants caught with drugs at the border know they are transporting drugs, could have implications for prosecuting everything from complex financial crimes to gun and drug cases, says Kenneth Notter at MoloLamken.
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A Refresher On Witness Testimony In 3 Key Settings
The recent controversy over congressional testimony from university presidents about antisemitism on campus serves as a reminder to attorneys about what to emphasize and avoid when preparing witnesses to testify before Congress, and how this venue differs from grand jury and trial proceedings, say Jack Sharman and Tyler Yarbrough at Lightfoot Franklin.
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A Post-Mortem Analysis Of Stroock's Demise
After the dissolution of 147-year-old firm Stroock late last year shook up the legal world, a post-mortem analysis of the data reveals a long list of warning signs preceding the firm’s collapse — and provides some insight into how other firms might avoid the same disastrous fate, says Craig Savitzky at Leopard Solutions.
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Preparing For DOJ's Data Analytics Push In FCPA Cases
After the U.S. Department of Justice’s recent announcement that it will leverage data analytics in Foreign Corrupt Practice Act investigations and prosecutions, companies will need to develop a compliance strategy that likewise implements data analytics to get ahead of enforcement risks, say attorneys at Cozen O'Connor.
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Considering The Logical Extremes Of Your Legal Argument
Recent oral arguments in the federal election interference case against former President Donald Trump highlighted the age-old technique of extending an argument to its logical limit — a principle that is still important for attorneys to consider in preparing their cases, says Reuben Guttman at Guttman Buschner.