Business Crimes Hotline

During the ACI Foreign Corrupt Practices Act conference on Nov. 29, 2018, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein announced a relaxing of the Individual Accountability for Corporate Wrongdoing Memorandum (the Yates Memo) in both criminal and civil cases. The Yates Memo, issued in 2015 by then-Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, set forth six key standards promoting increased Department of Justice (DOJ) actions against individuals responsible for corporate misconduct:

1. To be eligible for any cooperation credit, corporations must provide the [DOJ] all relevant facts about individuals involved in the corporate misconduct;
2. Both criminal and civil corporate investigations should focus on individuals from the inception of the investigation;
3. Criminal and civil attorneys handling corporate investigations should be in routine communication with one another;
4. Absent extraordinary circumstances, no corporate resolution should provide protection from criminal or civil liability for any individuals;
5. Corporate cases should not be resolved without a clear plan to resolve related individual cases; and
6. Civil attorneys should evaluate whether to bring suit against an individual based on considerations beyond that individual's ability to pay.

Emphasizing the need for practical application of the Yates Memo — and citing instances where the memo's policy had not been consistently applied — Rosenstein explained that companies will now only be expected to “identify every individual who was substantially involved in or responsible for the criminal conduct,” including reporting “all wrongdoing by senior officials.”