By: Sara Kropf The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act has been used by prosecutors to charge individuals who "exceed authorized access" (or act "without authorization") on a computer--sometimes their employers' computers, sometimes a stranger's computer that they are...
By: Sara Kropf Like most defense attorneys, I welcomed the Supreme Court’s decision in the McDonnell case. The Court vacated former Governor McDonnell’s convictions for Hobbs Act extortion and honest services fraud and remanded the case to the Fourth...
By: Sara Kropf Calling all data geeks: The United States Sentencing Commission just issued its “Overview of Federal Criminal Cases, Fiscal Year 2015.” It’s a fairly short summary of the longer “2015 Sourcebook of Federal Sentencing Statistics," which is also worth...
By: Sara Kropf The government knows—and exploits the fact—that loss amount is the driver of white collar sentences. In criminal contracting fraud cases, the government has taken the position that the relevant loss is the entire amount of the contract that was...
By: Sara Kropf Department of Justice officials have recently made several speeches trying to explain the Yates Memo. For example, On May 10, Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates gave remarks at the New York City Bar Association’s white-collar crime conference. On May...
By: Sara Kropf For anyone who handles FCPA cases, the blog aptly titled FCPA Professor is required reading. Professor Mike Koehler covers all aspects of the statute, from reported court decisions interpreting its reach to updates on recent prosecutions under it. Prof....
By: Sara Kropf The federal wire fraud statute is incredibly broad. In this era of non-stop email and texts, it’s hard to imagine a white collar case that doesn't implicate it. For the most part, courts have been reluctant to limit its reach. But a recent decision from...
By: Sara Kropf I teach a continuing legal education class on defending white-collar criminal cases. When I developed the curriculum, I quickly realized that one of the class’s main goals was to teach everyone the lingo of being a white-collar defense lawyer. This is...
By: Sara Kropf I’ve been thinking recently about the inequalities of negotiations when you are a criminal defense attorney. We do a lot of negotiating for our clients, right? And we often lose. Badly. We make plea deals for our clients and they end up with felony...
By: Sara Kropf The NewYorker recently published an interesting article, “Why the SEC Didn’t Hit Goldman Sachs Harder.” The article posits that the SEC let individual executives on Wall Street off the hook for securities fraud after the financial crisis. The article...