The end of the road for Roger Ng, the Goldman Sachs Investment Banker, who played a critical role in the Goldman Sachs 1 MDB Malaysia scandal, was not a pretty one. District Judge Margo Brodie gave Ng a severe sentence of ten (10) years’ imprisonment. At the sentencing hearing, Judge Brodie chastised Ng for participating in a massive scheme to steal billions of dollars from...
History is written by the winners – Napoleon It’s never just a game when you’re winning – George Carlin On the top of its record of success, DOJ won two big and highly-contested cases. The first against Elizabeth Holmes and the second against Roger Ng. In perhaps one of its most significant failures, DOJ was handed a quick acquittal of Mark Forkner, Boeing’s Flight Technical...
The scandal emanating from the 1 Malaysia Development Berhad fund (1MDB) continues to ripple through criminal law enforcement and criminal prosecutions. Just to remind everyone, last year’s most significant FCPA enforcement case resulted in a $3 billion settlement with the Justice Department, the SEC and other agencies. Tim Leissner, the former Goldman Sachs Southeast Asia Chairman pleaded guilty to conspiracy to money laundering and FCPA...
Bear with me for a second, but remember Presidential Candidate Romney’s statement in 2011 that “Corporations are people.” Starting with that premise, my so-called “Person” of the Year award for 2020 goes to, drumroll . . . Goldman Sachs, for its defining ethical and compliance lapses, leading to the largest ever FCPA Settlement. With tongue in cheek, the story of 2020 has to be the...
DOJ and the SEC each had a great year in FCPA enforcement. But it is important to acknowledge that the blockbuster case, Goldman Sachs, was the driver of this successful year. Goldman Sachs Goldman Sachs paid DOJ and the SEC nearly $4 billion in fines and disgorgement. DOJ has reccivered nearly $1` billion in assets through its forfeiture initiative. Goldman Sachs was a massive and...
The breadth of Goldman Sachs’ corruption in the recent DOJ and SEC FCPA enforcement action underscored the important global goal of reducing corruption. It goes without saying – corruption has a pernicious impact on economic development of fragile economies to the detriment of thousands, if not millions, of innocent civilians. The measurement of such harms is often cited to describe the scope of suffering for...
Goldman Sachs now sits atop all charts with the largest US FCPA bribery penalty, totaling approximately $2.9 billion. The second largest is Ericsson’s 2019 FCPA settlement for $1 billion. There is a reason that Goldman “earned” this distinction. The bribery scheme and controls and compliance failures are repugnant and pervasive. Goldman’s corruption scheme was built on stealing funds from the 1MDB account that was intended...
The Justice Department finally closed out its investigation of Goldman Sachs’ massive bribery scheme involving Malaysia’s 1MDB fund. The case is now the largest in US FCPA history (based on its payment to DOJ and related US agencies). Goldman Sachs entered into three-year deferred prosecution agreement (“DPA”) with the filing of a criminal information charging conspiracy to violate the anti-bribery provisions of the FCPA. At...
The former deputy finance chair of the Republican National Committee and prominent fundraiser for President Trump has agreed to plead guilty with lobbying on behalf of Jho Low, an indicted and fugitive financier, who was charged in the ongoing 1MDB sovereign wealth fund investigation and prosecution. Broidy agreed to assist Jho Low by lobbying the Justice Department and administration and failed to register as required...
Last week, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) filed charges against Asante Berko, a former Goldman Sachs executive with bribery of foreign government officials in Ghana. Goldman Sachs discovered and stopped the scheme and then reported it to the government. Goldman Sachs was not charged with the conduct and cooperated with the investigation. The SEC’s complaint charged Berko with assisting a client, a Turkish energy...
