With its decision in Digital Realty v. Somers, the U.S. Supreme Court dealt a blow to companies interested in learning of their own securities violations before the government gets the heads-up. The case's outcome means whistleblowers who might have reported violations internally will be incentivized to bypass their own companies' compliance mechanisms in favor of immediate reporting to the SEC.
While laws such as the FCPA do not necessarily prohibit hiring individuals with criminal records or bad credit records or who are former government officials, they do require employers to identify these individuals and assess whether their hire would pose a threat, violate the laws outright or impose an administratively difficult burden due to the need to monitor their activities.
For members of a conservative industry that — literally — wrote the rulebook on sexual harassment, law firms need to be ready for a day of reckoning that seems inescapable.
Part One of a Two-Part Article
Part One of this article examines key actions brought by U.S. regulators against compliance officers in 2017 based on their failures to ensure that their firms maintain effective compliance and AML programs.
As useful as evidence from the archived Internet can be in many white collar trials, admitting it into evidence is not always a straightforward proposition, as a number of recent cases show.
The enforcement action alleges that Las Vegas-based My Big Coin Pay Inc., a virtual currency wallet and platform, misappropriated more than $6 million from its customers for “personal expenses and the purchase of luxury goods.”
Wells Fargo & Co. has reached a settlement with a former branch manager who claimed she was fired for blowing the whistle on employees who had been opening accounts without permission, the sales-pressure conduct at issue in a scandal that erupted in 2016.
The details might not be quite as dramatic as they were in Waymo v. Uber, but lawyers expect trade secrets to continue to be a fertile source for litigation.
