Source: https://www.maglaw.com/publications/articles
Timestamp: 2019-04-24 17:47:10+00:00

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In the past few years, the government has brought several prosecutions targeting “spoofing” activity in the commodity futures markets, with mixed results at trial. In this article, we survey recent prosecutions in which the government has attempted to prosecute spoofing activity under traditional fraud statutes, including commodities fraud and wire fraud, which requires the government to prove that a defendant made a false statement or a material misrepresentation. To make that showing, the government has argued that spoofing—bidding or offering with the intent to cancel the bid or offer before execution—involves an implied misstatement to the market regarding supply and demand and a defendant’s willingness to trade. In response, defendants (joined by financial industry associations) have forcefully criticized the government’s novel theory as an overly expansive application of the wire-fraud statute. How the federal courts address the applicability of traditional fraud statutes to spoofing-related activity will have significant implications for market participants.
Beginning with Apprendi v. New Jersey in 2000, the U.S. Supreme Court has extended the Sixth Amendment to the imposition of terms of imprisonment and fines. In recent years, defendants have argued that the reasoning of Apprendi also applies to restitution – a mandatory and increasingly significant aspect of white-collar sentencing. While this argument has failed in the circuit courts, two justices of the Supreme Court, dissenting from a denial of certiorari, recently suggested that the high court should look closely at the issue. In this article, we discuss the brief dissent of Justice Gorsuch, joined by Justice Sotomayor, indicating that the Apprendi doctrine might appropriately be applied to restitution in criminal cases.
Whistleblowing has become big business, resulting in thousands of submissions each year and generating billions of dollars in recoveries by the IRS. Over the years, however, whistleblowers and their lawyers have lodged several complaints regarding the IRS’s management of the Whistleblower Program. In this article, I discuss the Whistleblower Program, highlight a recent statutory change, which has led to a banner year for awards, and conclude that, in order for the Whistleblower Program to reach its full potential, the IRS could benefit from additional resources to allow it to investigate worthwhile leads on a more timely basis.
An order imposing sanctions catches the attention of litigants, sometimes even encouraging the parties to settle. When they do, the sanctioned party often will seek to have the sanctions award vacated as part of the settlement. Increasingly, judges are resistant to vacating sanctions orders. In this article, we discuss Southern District Judge Victor Marrero’s recent decision in Rogue Wave Software v. BTI Systems, which highlights the trend away from courts vacating sanctions orders just because the parties’ settlement agreement provides for it, and concludes that going forward, the more egregious the conduct leading to a sanctions order, the less likely it is that a court will vacate it.
The halfway point of President Trump’s term offers an opportunity to examine and assess the impact of his administration on business-related prosecutions. In this article, we discuss the government’s shift in enforcement priorities, which focus on violent crimes, opioid cases, and most notably, immigration violations. We also highlight the decline not only in the number of traditional white-collar cases brought, but also in the amounts of fines and penalties imposed. Despite these numbers, however, the Trump Justice Department has remained aggressive and creative in its pursuit of individual wrongdoers in certain business-related areas, particularly in international corruption and foreign bribery.
FBAR Penalties: Relief for Taxpayers?
By statute, taxpayers who fail to disclose accounts on a Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Account, commonly referred to as an FBAR, are subject to a maximum penalty of up to 50% of the funds in the undisclosed accounts. However, two recent district court opinions have held that the applicable regulations cap the FBAR penalty at $100,000 per undisclosed account. In this article, we analyze four recent cases that have split on the maximum permissible FBAR penalty and the implications of this debate.
In cases of misconduct by the government, federal law strongly favors narrowly tailored remedies in criminal cases. The ultimate sanction, dismissal of an indictment, is reserved for the most extreme wrongdoing. In this article, we discuss the Second Circuit’s recent decision in United States v. Walters, which affirmed an insider trading conviction notwithstanding undisputed, improper leaks to news reporters by an FBI agent prior to indictment.
In the past few years, the Supreme Court has issued a number of decisions emphasizing that the Constitution’s limits on personal jurisdiction have real teeth. In this article, we discuss Chief Judge Colleen McMahon’s recent decision in Nike v. Wu, which applied certain general principles of specific jurisdiction to the New York activities of a group of foreign banks against whom discovery was sought in the Southern District of New York in connection with a judgment enforcement proceeding.
The Justice Department’s prosecution of the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) case illustrates how despite early predictions otherwise, Trump administration enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act is alive and well. In this article, we discuss the 1MDB case and examine the extent to which the Justice Department will adhere to the Administration’s declared intent not to “employ the hammer of criminal enforcement to extract unfair settlements” from corporations where there is cooperation and evidence of a strong compliance structure.
The past decade has brought multiple significant decisions in insider trading law, but has not substantially clarified the line between legal and illegal trading. In this article, we address how some degree of this lack of clarity can be traced to certain institutional dynamics at play in the courts issuing the relevant decisions. In particular, we look at both the Second Circuit’s uniquely strong preference for avoiding en banc review and the Supreme Court’s general preference for narrow decisions, and assess the ways in which these dynamics have shaped and may continue to shape insider trading jurisprudence.
Southern District Judge Robert W. Sweet’s recent decision in Giuffre v. Maxwell addresses the press’s application to unseal potentially salacious documents covered by a protective order in an action concerning allegations of sexual abuse. In this article, we discuss Judge Sweet’s analysis of the law in the Second Circuit on protective orders and the sealing of “judicial documents,” and the tension between the public’s right of access and interest in transparency in the legal system and the individual’s right to privacy.
Contrary to Hollywood’s fictionalized vision of our criminal justice system, a recent report from the National Association for Criminal Defense Lawyers confirms what many have recognized: trials are an endangered species. In this article, we discuss how the "trial penalty"-- the difference between the result a defendant may obtain by pleading guilty and the far harsher result that same defendant may receive if found guilty after trial -- has skewed our criminal justice system.
Congress has armed the government with an arsenal of weapons to extend limitations periods in white-collar cases that prosecutors have used in increasingly creative ways that are often difficult for defendants to predict. In this article, we examine the various tools at the government’s disposal, including mutual legal assistance treaties in cross-border matters; FIRREA’s ten-year statute of limitations for frauds “affecting” financial institutions; criminal conspiracy charges; tax crimes; and war-time extensions. We highlight a recent decision in United States v. Bogucki, a wire fraud prosecution, which is a prime example of how the government may lie in wait before launching hidden “time” bombs to lengthen the applicable limitations period.
Under the Internal Revenue Code, employers are responsible for accounting for and paying over to the IRS taxes that they withhold from their employees. In United States v. Sertich, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit held that an employer who willfully fails either to account for or to pay over such taxes commits a felony under 26 U.S.C. § 7202. In this article, we address Sertich’s holding that, while Section 7202 lists a series of acts using the conjunctive “and,” the statute imposes mandatory obligations, all of which must be affirmatively fulfilled. Sertich is also noteworthy in its discussion of the government’s heightened burden of proving willfulness in criminal tax cases.
‘Obey-the‑Law’ Injunctions: Is Time Running Out for the SEC?
SEC enforcement actions are subject to a five-year statute of limitations on civil penalties, but the SEC has often been able to enlarge its time for bringing an action by seeking equitable relief, notably, “obey-the-law” injunctions and disgorgement. In recent years, however, courts have begun to curtail this de facto enlargement of the limitations period. In Kokesh v. SEC, the Supreme Court held that disgorgement is a penalty subject to a five-year statute of limitations. Following Kokesh, courts have begun to address another important question: whether so-called obey-the-law injunctions constitute a penalty subject to the five-year limitations period. In our latest article, we discuss a recent decision of Judge Nicholas Garaufis in SEC v. Cohen, which held that an obey-the-law injunction, like disgorgement, is a penalty subject to a five-year limitations period.
New York’s economic loss rule, which acts as a check on asserting tort claims for purely economic damages, has long confounded practitioners. The rule, intended to preserve the distinction between contract and tort law and to protect defendants from disproportionate damages, has its most straightforward application in products liability and construction cases, but has been applied in a broad array of cases. In this article, we discuss a recent SDNY decision by Judge William H. Pauley III in Ambac v. U.S. Bank, which arises in the context of an RMBS case, but provides an interesting and informative lens for viewing the interplay between contract and breach of fiduciary duty claims under New York law.

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