Twenty Things You

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Crime Without Conviction: The Rise of Deferred and Non Prosecution Agreements

Top Ten Corporate and White Collar Crime Prosecutors

Top 100 False Claims Act Settlements

Top 10 White Collar Crime Defense Lawyers

Top 100 Corporate Criminals of the 1990s

Public Corruption in the United States

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BLACK: OBAMA’S FINANCIAL REGULATION PROPOSAL DOOMED TO FAIL
WASHINGTON, D.C., JULY 1, 2009

President Obama’s financial regulation proposal is doomed to fail.

Why?

Because it was developed by people who don’t believe in regulation.

That’s the take of William K. Black, a profess of law and economics at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

Black believes that the only way to prevent future financial meltdowns is to have in place a regulatory system and prosecutorial system developed by people with a proven track record.

People like Michael Patriarca. And William Black

First thing Black would do?

Implant at every financial regulator an office of the chief criminologist.

for the full story

DOROSHOW: OBAMA WILLING TO SELL OUT PATIENTS RIGHTS
WASHINGTON, D.C., JUNE 23, 2009

President Obama is essentially willing to sell the rights of injured patients down the river in order to get the Republicans onto his health care plan.

That’s the take of Joanne Doroshow, executive director of the Center for Justice & Democracy.

“It seems as if he’s going to take an approach that we haven’t heard often before in the traditional tort reform battles,” Doroshow told Corporate Crime Reporter in an interview last week. “That would be to use clinical guidelines or so called best practice standards as some sort as a defense against a medical malpractice claim. It could be an immunity. It could be a presumption of some sort. We’re not sure how he plans to use it. But the idea would be if some medical society comes out with a standard that the doctor or hospital must meet, and that standard is complied with, then the injured patient would have no recourse, would have no opportunity to go to court against the hospital or doctor and find out whether or not negligence was involved.”

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JOHN KOCORAS: FROM PROSECUTOR, TO KROLL, TO MCDERMOTT WILL
WASHINGTON, D.C., JUNE 17, 2009

Foot doctor bills Medicare for operations he didn’t conduct.

Government investigates.

FBI calls patients and asks – did the doctor operate.

Foot doctor tries to head off the investigation.

Calls patients.

Wants to talk.

One patient tells doctor she’s going to tell the truth.

Foot doctor kills patient before she can appear before a grand jury.

Foot doctor prosecuted for fraud.

Foot doctor prosecuted for obstruction of justice by murder.

Foot doctor sentenced to death.

for the full story

WE DON’T DO THE CARROTS, WE JUST DO THE STICK
WASHINGTON, D.C., JUNE 12, 2009

Employers have been emboldened by the global economic and political climate to act more aggressively and more punitively against workers.

That’s the conclusion of a study – No Holds Barred: The Intensification of Employer Opposition to Organizing – released last month by Cornell University Professor Kate Bronfenbrenner.

The study finds that private sector employer opposition to workers’ efforts to form unions has intensified and become more punitive than in the past.

Employers are more than twice as likely to use ten or more tactics – including threats of and actual firings – in their campaigns to thwart workers’ organizing efforts.

Today’s anti-union activities include a greater focus than in the past on more coercive and punitive tactics designed to intensely monitor and punish union activity.

“It’s almost as if employers today have the attitude – we don’t care, we don’t have to care about the law, about public opinion,” Bronfenbrenner told Corporate Crime Reporter last week. “We don’t do the carrots. We just do the stick.”

for the full story

GRASSO ATTORNEY FIRES BACK AT SPITZER
WASHINGTON, D.C., JUNE 2, 2009

Eliot Spitzer is on a tour of media outlets – large and small.

Earlier this month, it was Corporate Crime Reporter’s turn to interview Spitzer.

And what we published did not sit well with Williams & Connolly partner Gerson Zweifach.

In the interview, Spitzer defended his lawsuit against former New York Stock Exchange Chairman Richard Grasso.

Spitzer said that “we won a summary judgment motion from the trial court,” and then an appellate judge appointed in a “political deal” ruled that the conversion of the Stock Exchange to a for-profit business robbed the court of jurisdiction, an “aberrant decision” that Spitzer’s successor, Attorney General Cuomo, inexplicably failed to appeal.

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HOLLAND & KNIGHT’S CHRISTOPHER MYERS ON SIGTARP RAMP UP
WASHINGTON, D.C., JUNE 1, 2009

SIGTARP.

Know what it stands for?

SIGTARP is the Special Inspector General for the Toxic Asset Relief Program.

SIGTARP’s office is in the belly of the beast – 1500 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D.C.

His name: Neil Barofsky.

And he’s making waves inside the beltway and beyond.

Next month, the American Bar Association will sponsor a panel discussion titled TARP Compliance and Enforcement – What the Legal and Financial Sectors Can Expect.

The panel will be chaired by Christopher Myers.

Myers is a partner at Holland & Knight in McLean, Virginia.

for the full story

TRYING TO DRAIN A SWAMP WITH A GARDEN HOSE
WASHINGTON, D.C., MAY 21, 2009

The Justice Department is trying to drain a swamp of fraud with a garden hose.

That’s the take of Patrick Burns, communications director at Taxpayers Against Fraud.

“They have diverted entirely new rivers of fraud into the swamp,” Burns told Corporate Crime Reporter in an interview last week. “And then you go and look at the U.S. Department of Justice. It has good, hard-working honest people working there. But there are not enough of them. We are trying to drain a swamp with a garden hose. And that’s not a program for success.”

“There are only about 100 cases a year being moved in the False Claims Act arena,” Burns said. “And it hasn’t gone up – or down. That’s as many cases that can run through the pipe. And that’s a problem. If you have an expanding swamp of fraud, you need to expand the pipe you are using to drain. And that’s where Congress and the White House have fallen down on the job.”

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SPITZER: IF IT’S TOO BIG TO FAIL, IT’S TOO BIG
WASHINGTON, D.C., MAY 12, 2009

Eliot Spitzer says – if it’s too big to fail, it’s too big.

Spitzer now believes that the federal government ought to focus more of its attention on structural changes to the financial services industry.

And they should start by busting up the big banks that are deemed too big to fail.

“Some prosecutors will think structural reform is more fundamentally important than just getting a scalp and just prosecuting the individual – who may or may not be a cog in the wheel,” Spitzer told Corporate Crime Reporter in an interview last week. “I tried to highlight the structural issues rather than just put up one person on a poster and say – he’s a villain. That is a transitory victory. Finding a structural answer is more long lasting. Today, we all understand that the structural flaws in the system were deep seated.”

“So, that is the ideological choice we make. Do you want to bring cases that merely say – we caught three bad people? Or do you want to make a case that says – these three people were part of the system. But the system itself was broken.”

Although he does wish he could have stopped Bernie Madoff.

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