Features
Independent Corporate Investigations
In this age of regulatory and prosecutorial focus on corporate compliance, companies increasingly are relying on special outside counsel to conduct internal investigations into potential wrongdoing. Sometimes, these investigations are prophylactic: A company may want to understand the consequences of its current hiring practices so it can develop standard operating procedures to better ensure compliance with anti-discrimination laws. Because this sort of proactive, self-reflective investigation generally proceeds without outside scrutiny, counsel has the time and space to conduct a deliberate investigation.
Features
Your Best Worker Can Become Your Worst Nightmare
Although difficult to imagine, your best worker may hold the key to your company's worst security nightmare. Technologically armed employees who routinely use BlackBerry devices, personal digital assistants, laptops, and tiny flash drives to transport critical information to and from the office can wreak havoc on a corporation '' with no intention to do so.
Features
Litigation Readiness
With the amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (FRCP), precedent-setting adverse sanctions against some of the largest corporations and growing regulatory requirements, the need to become 'litigation ready' has been like a large snowball, gaining mass and momentum. The indisputable need to become litigation ready has arrived, and the snowball continues to get bigger and faster as it heads down the mountain. With the FRCP amendments, Dec. 1 has come and gone and guess what? Nothing has exploded.
Features
The Michigan Dioxin Study: Help for Defendants in Toxic Tort Litigation
The first part of this article discussed dioxin litigation and the use of environmental and blood data, and the design and results of the University of Michigan study. The conclusion addresses how to use the study.
Features
Round Up the Usual Suspects: Traditional Methods of Selecting First-Chair Trial Counsel Exclude Women
'You can't be shining lights at the Bar because you are too kind. You can never be corporation lawyers because you are not cold-blooded. You have not a high grade of intellect. I doubt you could ever make a living.' Clarence Darrow to women lawyers. Morello, Bar Admission Was Rough for 19th Century Women, 189 N.Y.L.J. 19 (1983).
Features
Practice Tip: Crafting a Winning Document Retention Policy to Avoid Court-Imposed Penalties
From the moment a manufacturer decides to undertake a new venture, it creates a staggering number of documents. These documents run the gamut from new product designs to market studies to safety test results. Even small-scale manufacturers may generate enough documents to fill a small warehouse, thus begging the question: Are we required by law to keep all these documents?
Features
Speaking Outside the Box: Juror Questioning of Witnesses at Trial
It would be unheard of if a student were to be told that he or she was required to master a course of study without having the ability to voice any questions along the way. In fact, from Socrates' time to the present, teachers at all levels typically encourage interactive learning. Until recently, however, the process through which a jury arrives at the facts of a given case is a fairly passive process — with the exception of the deliberative process at the close of the case.
Features
Be Careful What You Wish For
In the wake of the demise of Arthur Andersen following the partnerships' indictment by the federal government, prosecutors are increasingly pressuring corporations to enter into deferred-prosecution agreements (DPAs) to avoid ' at least temporarily ' full-blown criminal prosecutions. While these agreements may seem to offer an attractive option to embattled companies faced with the prospect of a lengthy and potentially devastating criminal prosecution, the freedom with which the individual prosecutors operate when crafting the agreements should cause concern.
Features
Voluntary Disclosures Under the FCPA
<i>' ' [A]lthough nothing is off the table when you voluntarily disclose, I can tell you in unequivocal terms that you will get a real benefit ' '</i> Despite these heartening words by Assistant U.S. Attorney General Alice S. Fisher at a recent conference on the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), an attorney representing a corporation cannot recommend voluntary disclosure of potentially criminal FCPA activities without weighing the promise of a 'real benefit' against the very real risks.
Need Help?
- Prefer an IP authenticated environment? Request a transition or call 800-756-8993.
- Need other assistance? email Customer Service or call 1-877-256-2472.
MOST POPULAR STORIES
- Judge Rules Shaquille O'Neal Will Face Securities Lawsuit for Promotion, Sale of NFTsA federal district court in Miami, FL, has ruled that former National Basketball Association star Shaquille O'Neal will have to face a lawsuit over his promotion of unregistered securities in the form of cryptocurrency tokens and that he was a "seller" of these unregistered securities.Read More ›
- Compliance Officers and Law Enforcement: Friends or Foes?<b><i>Part Two of a Two-Part Article</b></i><p>As we saw in Part One, regulators have recently shown a tendency to focus on compliance officers who they deem to have failed to ensure that the compliance and anti-money laundering (AML) programs that they oversee adequately prevented corporate wrongdoing, and there are several indications that regulators will continue to target compliance officers in 2018 in actions focused on Bank Secrecy Act/AML compliance.Read More ›
- Bankruptcy Sales: Finding a Diamond In the RoughThere is no efficient market for the sale of bankruptcy assets. Inefficient markets yield a transactional drag, potentially dampening the ability of debtors and trustees to maximize value for creditors. This article identifies ways in which investors may more easily discover bankruptcy asset sales.Read More ›
- Structuring Strategies for Off-Balance-Sheet Treatment of Real Property LeasesThe Financial Accounting Standards Board released a new set of lease accounting standards, ASC 842, which went into effect earlier this year. Most significantly, publicly traded companies are now obligated to list all leases of 12 months or longer on their balance sheets as both assets and liabilities. Large private companies will follow suit in 2020.Read More ›
- Removing Restrictive Covenants In New YorkIn Rockwell v. Despart, the New York Supreme Court, Third Department, recently revisited a recurring question: When may a landowner seek judicial removal of a covenant restricting use of her land?Read More ›