By Sara Kropf The Securities and Exchange Commission just announced settled charges against The Cheesecake Factory for making misleading disclosures about COVID-19’s impact on its financial situation. According to the SEC’s press release, “[t]he action is the SEC's...
By: Sara Kropf One of the biggest questions on everyone’s mind right now is when a vaccine for COVID-19 will be ready. A related question is whether anyone will develop an effective treatment for it. In the United States, vaccines and new drug treatments are approved...
By Sara Kropf There have been heartwarming stories of good deeds during the coronavirus pandemic, from the adorable (kids helping elderly neighbors) to the downright heroic (doctors and nurses risking their own lives). But one particularly viral (pun intended)...
By Dan Portnov Occasionally we work on cases or investigations that involve highly wonky subject matter – stuff that only lawyers or legislators would know and care about. One of those recent matters touched on the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act,...
By: Sara Kropf I recently listened to Preet Bharara’s podcast on a long car ride. He’s the former United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York. After months of conducting interviews of government-side subjects—prosecutors, FBI agents and the like—he...
By: Sara Kropf In Part I of the series, I introduced the idea that defense counsel are increasingly fighting back against DOJ in creative ways. In Part II, we talked about Sheldon Silver and his defense counsel's efforts to use DOJ's very public statements against Mr....
The SEC finally gave up the ship in its insider trading case against former hedge fund managers Anthony Chiasson and Todd Newman. After the Second Circuit reversed their convictions and the Supreme Court denied cert, the SEC decided not to pursue its civil suit...
Peter J. Henning, in the always-interesting White Collar Watch, has a great article today about what may be the Department of Justice's newest way to weasel out of the Newman decision. The defendant in an insider trading case in Atlanta was just acquitted at trial of...
The common wisdom in appellate work is to avoid the "kitchen sink" approach. Narrow your issues to the strong ones, so the court can focus on them and not be distracted by less persuasive ones. The problem with that approach in a criminal case is that waiver is the...
By: Sara Kropf The federal government’s aggressive approach to criminal forfeiture unquestionably targets innocent bystanders to crime. In fact, the law makes it easy—and profitable—for the government to do so. A recent high-profile insider trading case in New...