Defensa en Asuntos Criminales Económicos

Adam Kaufmann, who served 18 years as a prosecutor in the Manhattan district attorney’s office, appeared on MSNBC's The Last Word to discuss why witnesses are granted immunity when testifying before a grand jury in New York and what to expect of the grand jury in the criminal probe of Donald Trump.

LBKM partner Cristián Francos has been appointed as Senior Vice Chair of the IBA’s Business Crime Committee.

Cristián Francos been recognized as a Global Leader in Who’s Who Legal: Investigations 2021.  Who’s Who Legal is one of the world’s leading directories of legal practitioners.

Spanish newspaper El Mundo reported on a ruling by Spain's Constitutional Court holding that the imprisonment of Nervis Villalobos, a former Venezuelan official, was unconstitutional. Partner Manuel Varela represented Mr. Villalobos in the appeal.

Six LBKM professionals have been selected to the 2019 New York and Washington, DC Super Lawyers lists - an honor limited to 5 percent of the lawyers in each state. In addition, one LBKM professional has been selected to the 2019 New York Rising Stars list. 

Colleges and universities must recognize the risk of potential corruption in their admissions process, and build intelligent controls to guard against fraud. Lewis Baach’s Arthur D. Middlemiss explains that schools should employ cost-efficient compliance measures and warns of the dangers in failing to do so.

A government coverup of the Cohen reports “makes no sense,” said Aaron Wolfson, a lawyer who previously oversaw suspicious activity reporting for JPMorgan Chase. “I find that laughable.”

Mr. Francos was quoted in the article saying, “If someone received a bribe, then someone had to have paid the bribe,” he said. “Companies should be well prepared [to be investigated].”  He continued to say, many Argentinian companies that are contracted by the state do not have established policies in terms of compliance and integrity, and will likely rush to put together new compliance programmes. Francos said “this shock could be good” to improve standards quickly.  “This [scenario] creates a problem for companies, but also an opportunity that will bring change to Argentina’s business culture,” he said.

On Monday, Dec. 12, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision clarifying subsection 1 of the bank fraud statute, 18 U.S.C. §1344, in Shaw v. United States. Notwithstanding a veritable ocean of case law, regulations and statutes that delineate the difference between a bank’s property and that of its customers, the court quickly pushed such technical arguments to the side, holding that — for the purposes of the bank fraud statute — there is no practical difference between targeting a bank customer’s funds and targeting the bank’s own funds.

“The court’s decision is in keeping with the long-standing principle that a fraud can be prosecuted under the criminal law even if the victim does not suffer a loss — which is an important distinction between criminal fraud and civil fraud,” said A. Katherine Toomey, a partner at Lewis Baach PLLC.

For two years, stock traders and the attorneys who represent them said the law surrounding insider trading was a muddle, with no one knowing what exactly is or isn’t legal.
The U.S. Supreme Court Dec. 6 said it had ‘‘easily’’ settled the question (Salman v. United States, 2016 BL 404795, U.S., No. 15-628, 12/6/16).

‘‘Going forward, even remote tippees of inside information are at risk if the government can demonstrate that the defendant knew he was trading on inside information and the chain of disclosure is sufficiently close, even if no money changes hands.’’ Eric Lewis, Lewis Baach PLLC

Both the speed and the unanimity of the decision sent a strong message re-affirming existing insider trading prosecutions, according to Eric Lewis, a partner at Lewis Baach, a Washington DC law firm specializing in financial crimes.

"It was somewhat surprising that the Supreme Court took this case," Lewis told ValueWalk, noting that it had been two decades since the high court took up an insider trading case.

Mr. Francos is mentioned in the article.

The United States needs to consider carefully whether its treaty advantages and broad jurisdictional statutes should be aggressively used to bring foreign defendants to the United States when the American interest is limited and when other countries may have a greater interest in applying their own statutes, and their own penalty structures.

The Manhattan District Attorney’s investigation has nothing to do with federal law, public acts, or violations involving the political or electoral process. Moreover, as possible charges brought by a sovereign state, they cannot be pardoned by an outgoing President.

The increasing global focus on corruption has led to stronger international cooperation and coordination among regulators, resulting in landmark enforcement actions in new jurisdictions. [...] This panel offered private and public sector prespectives on the latest enforcement trends, the key elements of the new anti-corruption laws, and what all this means for businesses and individuals involved in transnational corruption cases.

Mr. Liston, an attorney for Rogicki in both the SEC and state court matters, told Law360 on Friday that his client has "accepted full responsibility for his actions.", an attorney for Rogicki in both the SEC and state court matters, told Law360 on Friday that his client has "accepted full responsibility for his actions."