Federal whistleblowers have been exposing health care fraud for years. The False Claims Act (“FCA”) contains robust whistleblower provisions and protections that reward whistleblowers with financial payouts. The process for...more
9/19/2024
/ Anti-Kickback Statute ,
CVS ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement Actions ,
False Claims Act (FCA) ,
Fraud and Abuse ,
Health Care Providers ,
Health Insurance ,
Healthcare Fraud ,
Medicare Advantage ,
Whistleblowers
How will the DOJ's new corporate whistleblower pilot program reshape the enforcement of corporate criminal conduct?
In this episode of Corruption, Crime, and Compliance, Michael Volkov explores the Department of Justice's...more
DOJ is pushing hard for voluntary disclosures and urging companies to take advantage of its Voluntary Disclosure Program. The carrot is significant — a declination in exchange for cooperation, remediation and disgorgement....more
9/5/2024
/ Compliance ,
Corporate Misconduct ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Disgorgement ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Fines ,
Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) ,
Fraud ,
Self-Disclosure Requirements ,
Settlement ,
Voluntary Disclosure ,
White Collar Crimes
The Justice Department is encouraging companies to voluntarily disclose criminal violations — “Come in and confess” and DOJ offers promises of a declination. But even a declination comes with a requirement — the company has...more
9/4/2024
/ Angola ,
Bribery ,
Compliance ,
Corruption ,
Criminal Investigations ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Disgorgement ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Fines ,
Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) ,
Popular ,
Voluntary Disclosure ,
White Collar Crimes
DOJ’s Antitrust Division has been relatively quiet in prosecuting criminal cartel or bid-rigging cases. Since 2015, the Antitrust Division’s criminal enforcement has fallen from the billions in penalties each year to the...more
8/27/2024
/ Antitrust Division ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Antitrust Violations ,
Bid Rigging ,
Construction Project ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Criminal Conspiracy ,
Criminal Prosecution ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Indictments ,
Market Allocation Scheme ,
Price-Fixing ,
Public Contracts ,
Sherman Act ,
Statutory Violations
While FCPA enforcement against companies has been relatively quiet this year, despite a strong beginning to the year — the SAP case for $220 million; and the Gunvor case for $661 million — DOJ has been pushing a number of...more
DOJ is joining the whistleblower reward sweepstakes in a big way. While the SEC has been grabbing headlines for its whistleblower reward program since 2010, DOJ now wants a piece of the action. DOJ cited gaps that exist...more
DOJ is feeling the heat. Corporate criminal enforcement numbers are down. in fairness, DOJ has been pushing individual criminal enforcement as an effective deterrent to corporate misconduct. Criminal prosecutions, when done...more
8/20/2024
/ Compliance ,
Corporate Misconduct ,
Corruption ,
Criminal Prosecution ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Federal Pilot Programs ,
Fraud ,
Money Laundering ,
Whistleblower Protection Policies ,
White Collar Crimes
The Boeing 737 MAX case took another dramatic turn. On July 24, 2024, the Department of Justice filed with the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas a proposed plea agreement with Boeing. The plea...more
DOJ and Boeing have entered into a proposed plea agreement that will require judicial scrutiny and determinations of the public interest and the victims’ rights under the Crime Victims’ Rights Act, 18 U.S.C. § 3771 [“CVRA”]. ...more
7/31/2024
/ Airplane Accidents ,
Aviation Industry ,
Boeing ,
Corporate Culture ,
Crime Victims ,
Criminal Prosecution ,
Deferred Prosecution Agreements ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Internal Controls ,
Plea Agreements ,
Safety Standards ,
White Collar Crimes
The Boeing 737 MAX case took another dramatic turn. On July 24, 2024, the Department of Justice filed with the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas a proposed plea agreement with Boeing. The plea...more
7/30/2024
/ Airplane Accidents ,
Aviation Industry ,
Board of Directors ,
Boeing ,
Compliance Monitoring ,
Deferred Prosecution Agreements ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Plea Agreements ,
Restitution ,
Safety Standards
In a pair of rulings issued near the end of the last Term, Fischer v. United States and Snyder v. United States, the Supreme Court continued to cut back on the Justice Department’s interpretation and enforcement of criminal...more
7/11/2024
/ Bribery ,
Criminal Liability ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement ,
Fischer v United States ,
Gifts ,
Illegal Gratuities ,
Public Officials ,
SCOTUS ,
Snyder v United States ,
Statutory Interpretation
In this new era of aggressive sanctions enforcement, companies have to understand the red lines that define where criminal and civil enforcement risk increase. In contrast to the history of FCPA enforcement, DOJ and OFAC...more
In this new era of aggressive sanctions enforcement, companies have to understand the red lines that define where criminal and civil enforcement risk increase. In contrast to the history of FCPA enforcement, DOJ and OFAC...more
With the beginning of the “New FCPA” era coined by DOJ’s Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, we now need to focus on third-party risk and sanctions enforcement. The law, the practice, and the risks are important and not just...more
On April 24, 2024, President Biden signed into law a sweeping national security legislative package that included the 21st Century Peace Through Strength Act, which includes measures to promote sanctions and export controls...more
5/30/2024
/ Biden Administration ,
China ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Economic Sanctions ,
Export Controls ,
FinCEN ,
Foreign Policy ,
International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) ,
National Security ,
New Legislation ,
Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) ,
Regulatory Requirements ,
Statute of Limitations ,
Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) ,
TWEA
Sigma-Aldrich, Inc., d/b/a MilliporeSigma (“MilliporeSigma”), a U.S. life sciences company based in Massachusetts, escaped criminal charges for export control violations, despite a former sales person’s scheme to illegally...more
5/29/2024
/ China ,
Criminal Conspiracy ,
Criminal Investigations ,
Criminal Prosecution ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Economic Sanctions ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Export Controls ,
Exports ,
Government Investigations ,
Guilty Pleas ,
Life Sciences ,
National Security ,
Wire Fraud
Sorry to start a four-part series with a reference to music from our long-ago past. The Four Tops sang the “Same Old Song, with a Different Meaning” (released in 1965). So, how does that relate to third-party risks? Well,...more
5/21/2024
/ Bribery ,
Compliance ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Economic Sanctions ,
Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) ,
Foreign Policy ,
Foreign Relations ,
Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) ,
Risk Management ,
Third-Party Risk ,
White Collar Crimes
In this new aggressive era of sanctions and export controls enforcement, companies need to understand the potential risks that DOJ and/or OFAC may identify a company for sanctions investigation....more
5/14/2024
/ Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) ,
Customs ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Export Controls ,
Exports ,
FinCEN ,
Foreign Policy ,
Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) ,
Popular ,
Sanction Violations ,
Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) ,
Whistleblowers
The Justice Department has a long and rich history of targeting dominant companies using antitrust monopolization tools — looking back to the 1980s, it was AT&T; in the 1990s, it was Microsoft; and in 2023, DOJ has brought a...more
As DOJ, OFAC and BIS ramp up sanctions and export controls enforcement, they have continued to provide important compliance guidance. You have to give the enforcement agencies credit — on the one hand, they regularly warn of...more
4/18/2024
/ Anti-Corruption ,
Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) ,
Compliance ,
Corruption ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Economic Sanctions ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Export Controls ,
Exports ,
Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) ,
Sanction Violations ,
White Collar Crimes
The Justice Department is rightly trumpeting its successful sweep of the commodities trading industry. DOJ’s success is reflected in its six separate corporate resolutions and 20 individual convictions, resulting in over...more
Trafigura’s bribery scheme resembles the same schemes implemented by its significant competitors — Vitol, Glencore, Gunvor. At the core of the conduct, Petrobras and Brazilian government officials collected bribes in...more
4/10/2024
/ Brazil ,
Bribery ,
Compliance ,
Corruption ,
Criminal Prosecution ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) ,
Oil & Gas ,
Petrobras ,
White Collar Crimes
On the heels of the Gunvor FCPA settlement for $661 million, DOJ announced its settlement with Trafigura, the latest commodities trading company to fall under DOJ’s FCPA Sweep against the industry. Trafigura joined the list...more
4/9/2024
/ Bribery ,
Commodities ,
Compliance ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Corruption ,
Criminal Prosecution ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) ,
Guilty Pleas ,
White Collar Crimes
DOJ has been on a public relations campaign to push a simple message for corporations: if companies learn of misconduct, companies should disclose such misconduct to earn valuable benefits. The quintessential question...more