In an unusual FCPA enforcement action, the Justice Department and the SEC resolved FCPA violations against Sociedad Quimica y Minera, a Chilean chemical and mining company, for a total of $30.5 million, for paying approximately $15 million in bribes to Chilean officials. SQM agreed to a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) with DOJ and to assignment of a two-year independent compliance monitor. The odd aspect of...

In its continuing quest to push the message of aggressive FCPA enforcement, the SEC resolved FCPA charges against Orthofix, a medical device company, for $6 million in penalties and disgorgement. In a related action, the SEC announced that Orthofix and four executives agreed to pay $8 million for accounting control errors. The Justice Department declined to prosecute Orthofix. All of this sounds reasonable, except for...

It’s easier to fool people than to convince them they have been fooled – Mark Twain The drug and medical device industries have been taking it on the FCPA chin for years. The risk factors in the international marketplace are significant – (1) healthcare professionals are normally government employees; (2) government regulation of healthcare is robust; and (3) healthcare professionals are underpaid and therefore demand...

As we look across the corporate governance landscape and focus on the spikes of corporate scandals, I started to wonder if there was any pattern or trend to the nature of corporate scandals. In the early 2000s, the country was rocked by financial accounting scandals and massive fraud in corporate reporting. In response, the Sarbanes-Oxley reforms were enacted, transforming the auditing and financial reporting requirements....

Just when we thought 2016 was over and we could all breathe a sigh of relief, DOJ and the SEC have continued to run with a string of new enforcement actions.   To all of those prognosticators, paparazzi, commentators, chicken littles, and dire warnings, the answer is clear – FCPA enforcement is here to stay, compliance is a must, and increased DOJ/SEC resources are bearing fruit....

When unraveling a major corporate scandal, especially multi-year schemes involving senior executives, the blame game or lessons learned approach can easily turn into a fruitless exercise. The VA and Takata scandals are important reminders of basic compliance and governance requirements. If carefully considered, they underscore the reasons why compliance programs exist and why an effective program is so critical in today’s global economy. My list...

In my continuing review of corporate misconduct in the automobile industry, today we examine the Takata Corporation scandal for its airbag scheme. Takata is a manufacturer and supplier of automotive safety equipment. It agreed to plead guilty to wire fraud and pay $1 billion in criminal penalties for its long-time scheme to sell defective airbag inflators. At the same time, the Justice Department announced the...

Corporate misconduct occurs in a variety of forms. Starting with the basic truism – companies act through people, and when companies engage in misconduct it requires the coordination and collaboration of multiple actors. The scope of such misconduct can vary, of course, and the greater the extent of the misconduct, the more actors are involved. The auto industry’s record on safety misconduct is legendary, stretching...

Lauren Connell, Managing Associate at the Volkov Law Group, joins us again for a posting on the Rolls Royce Anti-Corruption Settlement.  Lauren can be reached at [email protected]. Rolls Royce’s $800 million global settlement further solidifies what the future of anti-bribery and corruption enforcement looks like: multi-jurisdictional prosecutions based on egregious conduct supported by strong evidence. The similarities to the recent Odebrecht – Braskem $3.5 billion...

The first FCPA enforcement action for 2017 landed with very little fanfare. The SEC reached a settlement with Mondelez International for $13 million. The facts surround the hiring of an agent in India and the failure of Mondelez to monitor and conduct basic due diligence on the third-party agent. Kraft Foods acquired Cadbury, a UK candy and beverage company. Kraft Foods renamed itself Mondelez after...