The phrase tone at the top is becoming trite. Compliance professionals use it over and over, and few people explain how to apply the concept. Speakers and webinar presenters always gloss over tone at the top, emphasizing its importance but providing little practical advice. In some sense, it is hard to define in specific actions since the context and the actors can vary with respect...
My good friend and colleague Dan Chapman, now the CCO at VimpelCom, is a compliance rock star. I have known Dan for years, beginning when he took over at Parker Drilling and implemented a world-class remediation program to pull Parker Drilling through a difficult FCPA problem. Dan is now heading the effort to remediate and “fix” VimpelCom after the FCPA enforcement action announced last year....
Following a separate SEC action (here), the Justice Department resolved FCPA charges against Las Vegas Sands for $7 million. DOJ and Las Vegas Sands entered into a non-prosecution agreement (NPA) citing much of the same evidence outlined by the SEC in its enforcement action against Las Vegas Sands for $9 million. The Justice Department’s NPA includes a statement of facts centering on large payments made...
After years of fits and starts, and promises and disappointments, the Serious Fraud Office and the UK Bribery Act made its initial splash on the anti-corruption enforcement landscape. Since 2011, companies have been warned that the SFO would begin enforcing the UK Bribery Act. There have been a few enforcement actions and important legal modifications in the UK authorizing deferred prosecution agreements. While it has...
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...
Lessons Learned from 2016 — Strategies to Improve Your Compliance Program Tuesday February 7th, 9AM PST/ 12 PM EST SIGN UP HERE The United States Department of Justice and regulatory agencies continued to beat the drum on aggressive enforcement and the importance of compliance. The Trump Administration is unlikely to alter this effort, except in certain areas like civil antitrust and environmental and labor regulation....
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....
