Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division of the US Department of Justice, Lanny Breuer gave the final day’s keynote speech at the Compliance Week 2010 Conference. Many of his remarks were directed at the ethics and compliance professionals who attended the event. He confirmed that the Obama Administration is committed to combating financial fraud, particularly in the area of overseas bribery and corruption as prohibited by the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). He used a quote from Attorney General Holder in emphasizing this point, that bribery “is a scourge on civil society”.

He stated that tools which had been previously used to combat organized crime would now be employed in the fight against white collar crime, including both wiretaps and sting operations, as was used against the gun manufacturing industry in the operations which culminated in the arrests of 22 individuals in Las Vegas in January of this year. He also discussed that many foreign governments had entered into collaboration agreements to facilitate cross-border investigations and enforcement actions.