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Taxpayer Suffers SILO (Pre-tax) Loss in Wells Fargo
Recently publicized budget cuts at the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority (“MTA”) caused the closing of two subway lines and left thousands of New York City public-school children without the buses they usually take to school. Perhaps if Congress had not shut down SILOs in 2004, the MTA and many other major U.S. transit agencies would not be in such a financial bind. Thankfully, no one is asking the transits to disgorge the hundreds of millions of dollars of cash they raised doing LILOs and SILO sale-leaseback transactions on their railcars and buses. After all, their own regulator, the Federal Transit Administration, actively encouraged the transit agencies to engage in these “innovative financing transactions” (their name for SILOs). But that did not stop the IRS from litigating the tax benefits claimed by the banks and other corporations that provided the much-needed capital to the transit agencies in these transactions.
In Wells Fargo & Company v. United States, (Fed. Ct. Cl. No. 06-628T, Jan. 8, 2010), a court considered for the first time SILOs involving domestic municipal transit agency lessees. While one would have thought that the domestic and federally approved nature of the transactions would have some influence on the decision, they did not. The judge's decision and description of LILO and SILO transactions as “rotten to the core” reflect an unwelcome return to the result-oriented pro-government decision-making that has characterized most of the decided LILO/SILO cases.
The DOJ's Corporate Enforcement Policy: One Year Later
The DOJ's Criminal Division issued three declinations since the issuance of the revised CEP a year ago. Review of these cases gives insight into DOJ's implementation of the new policy in practice.
Use of Deferred Prosecution Agreements In White Collar Investigations
This article discusses the practical and policy reasons for the use of DPAs and NPAs in white-collar criminal investigations, and considers the NDAA's new reporting provision and its relationship with other efforts to enhance transparency in DOJ decision-making.
The DOJ's New Parameters for Evaluating Corporate Compliance Programs
The parameters set forth in the DOJ's memorandum have implications not only for the government's evaluation of compliance programs in the context of criminal charging decisions, but also for how defense counsel structure their conference-room advocacy seeking declinations or lesser sanctions in both criminal and civil investigations.
How AI Has Affected PR
When we consider how the use of AI affects legal PR and communications, we have to look at it as an industrywide global phenomenon. A recent online conference provided an overview of the latest AI trends in public relations, and specifically, the impact of AI on communications. Here are some of the key points and takeaways from several of the speakers, who provided current best practices, tips, concerns and case studies.