Government & Internal Investigations

When your company or its executives are facing a potential government investigation, you need a team that will mobilize and respond proactively as they build your defense. Whether facing a whistleblower lawsuit or parallel civil and criminal investigations, our team works to resolve matters quietly and efficiently, protecting your brand and reputation.

Alston & Bird offers its clients one of the most experienced and complete government investigations teams in the country. Comprised of former federal prosecutors and government attorneys with experience in Washington and throughout the country, our team understands government and prosecution perspectives and can effectively counsel companies seeking to avoid problems before they occur. If problems do arise, our extensive knowledge of how the government builds and prosecutes a case equips us to aggressively protect our clients from potential overreaching by authorities; manage the risks inherent in any investigation; coordinate the defense of parallel criminal, civil and administrative actions; and proactively resolve these matters in an efficient manner.

Government Experience and Regulatory Expertise

We represent public and private companies and executives in criminal and civil investigations before the U.S. Department of Justice and its U.S. Attorney’s Offices as well as other federal agencies such as the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Customs and Border Protection, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Office of Foreign Assets Control and the Food and Drug Administration. We also work on investigations conducted by Health and Human Services – Office of the Inspector General and state attorneys’ offices across the country. Our lawyers have tried approximately 200 criminal and civil cases and have hundreds of hours of federal and state grand jury experience. We have conducted numerous internal investigations and regularly represent clients in congressional investigations, advise clients on a wide variety of compliance issues and audit ethics and compliance programs to ensure that they meet the requirements of the United States Sentencing Guidelines for Corporations.

Our government investigations attorneys are retained to defend companies and their senior executives in an array of contexts, including against charges of:

antitrust violations
commercial bribery and kickbacks
environmental violations
False Claims Act
FDA Enforcement & Litigation
Foreign Corrupt Practice Act (FCPA) violations
health care fraud
procurement and government contract fraud
securities and commodities fraud

We are very experienced in internal and independent investigations, witness interviews, document collection, retention, production and analysis, as well as proactively assembling corroborative evidence in our client’s favor. While we pride ourselves on being first and foremost trial lawyers, our greatest successes are our least publicized ones—those in which a criminal investigation is never commenced, or where it is terminated without any charges being brought. When necessary, however, we will use our expertise to defend our client vigorously and with the highest professional and ethical standards throughout the investigation and trial of the matter.

In addition to our work with clients once a problem has arisen, we are well-versed in guiding companies to design compliance programs that prevent, deter and detect misconduct. We offer a broad range of services to help our clients implement or upgrade their ethics and compliance programs, including risk assessments, web-based and live training, compliance investigations and independent monitoring.

Accolades

Our government investigations attorneys are respected practitioners among their peers, as well as federal and state law enforcement. During their government service, they won distinguished service awards, such as the Department of Justice’s highest award, the Edmund J. Randolph Award; the Attorney General’s Special Commendation Award; Director’s Awards; and numerous special awards and commendations from federal and state law enforcement for their excellent work. Our attorneys have experience as presidentially appointed U.S. Attorneys, Director of the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, Associate Counsel to the President of the United States, Deputy Assistant Attorney General and Chief of Staff for the Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice, Senior Trial Attorney, Assistant Chief of the Environmental Crimes Section of the United States Department of Justice and Senior Counsel to the Assistant Attorney General for the United States. More than two dozen members of the practice served as Assistant United States Attorneys and Department of Justice trial attorneys.

Bringing Value to Our Clients

We understand the stress, distractions and difficulties a government investigation can cause and the importance of protecting a company’s brand and an individual’s reputation. Our goal is to proactively resolve the issues and guide our clients through this difficult and often unfamiliar process in a cost-effective and efficient manner. When an issue arises, we mobilize quickly, bringing our expertise to bear to work toward a positive resolution. Alston & Bird’s government investigations team stands ready and able to guide and protect both companies and individuals in today’s climate of heightened governmental scrutiny and criminal enforcement.

Antitrust

We won a jury verdict of acquittal for our client in a federal criminal antitrust trial brought by the Antitrust Division.
We defended a publicly traded company in parallel Department of Justice (DOJ) and Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) investigations related to alleged accounting fraud.

Environmental

We represented an oil and gas services company in a voluntary self-disclosure of possible criminal violations at one of its recently acquired facilities. The voluntary self-disclosure resulted in a declination of criminal charges against the company.
We successfully defended a large chemical manufacturing company under investigation for violations of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act for the alleged illegal disposal of hazardous waste that was shown to be exempt from regulations as a recycled product.
We successfully defended an officer of a container ship indicted for alleged violation of the Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships, obstruction of justice and conspiracy, resulting in the United States Attorney’s Office and the Environmental Crimes Section of the Department of Justice dismissing all charges against the defendant, who had been facing 15-21 months in prison.
We successfully defended a city that had received a target letter in a Clean Water Act criminal investigation. We negotiated with DOJ and the Environmental Protection Agency resulting in no charges being filed against the city.
We successfully defended a large textile manufacturer client in a Clean Water Act investigation involving legacy contamination at one of its manufacturing facilities. The matter resulted in no criminal charges being filed against the company or any individuals.

False Claims Act

We represent four defendants in a qui tam False Claims Act lawsuit against the alleged sale of products to the federal government that are claimed not to be compliant with the Trade Agreements Act. Our expertise in domestic source requirements in government procurement is unmatched. Just in this area, we have authored widely circulated articles, conducted internal investigations of manufacturing clients’ supply chains to address Buy American Act and Trade Agreements Act compliance issues, conducted seminars and trainings of sales staff and senior executives, traveled with clients on customer sales visits where ARRA and Buy American restrictions were a key issue and defended False Claims Act investigations and lawsuits alleging noncompliance.
We represent a client in an ongoing DOJ and Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Inspector General investigation into fraud in the E-Rate program.
We served as counsel to a NASDAQ company in the first reported investigation by the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), General Services Administration (GSA) and DOJ into a contractor’s alleged violation of the False Claims Act based upon a purported false certification of business size.
We successfully resolved a highly publicized defective pricing investigation by GSA and DOJ into our manufacturing client’s compliance with pricing obligations arising under the GSA Schedule.
We counseled a publicly traded company in a federal investigation of alleged fraudulent billings in connection with federal highway projects.
We handled investigations by the SBA Inspector General into the accuracy of small-business-size representations.
We’ve handled and assisted in investigations by grand juries into alleged over-billing, bribery and contract fraud.
We defended a major agribusiness in a federal grand jury investigation of alleged antitrust violations in the sale of agricultural products through a federally administered international aid program.
We are defending a manufacturer in a federal grand jury investigation of a sale of allegedly defective products to the Department of Defense.
We defended a Chicago-based parts remanufacturer in a federal grand jury investigation of alleged overbilling for reconditioning of parts for U.S. Navy ships and in related debarment proceedings.
We are defending a NYSE company in a state criminal investigation of an alleged procurement fraud involving a California port authority.
We defended a mortgage subsidiary of a major national life insurance company in connection with a federal grand jury investigation of a mortgage loan fraud related to a federally guaranteed mortgage loan program.
We represented a major wireless service provider in connection with the FCC’s auction of a spectrum and follow-on Antitrust Division investigation of alleged bid rigging in connection with the auction.
We represented a major information technology company in an investigation of fraud against the client by a former employee related to the performance of government contracts.
We recently advised a client on possible mandatory or voluntary disclosure issues arising out of allegations of kickbacks and improper payments by subcontractors.

Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and Anticorruption

We represented a large pharmaceutical company before the DOJ and SEC in an Iraq oil-for-food investigation and enforcement proceeding.
We conducted an internal investigation in the Middle East for a global tool manufacturer.
We conducted internal investigations in Italy and India for a Fortune 100 technology company.
We’ve provided advice to a U.S. logistics company operating in Iraq.
We prepared an internal anticorruption compliance program for a major medical products company with operations in over 100 countries.
We developed an internal anticorruption compliance program and counseling on individual practices and potential enforcement issues for a multibillion-dollar pharmaceutical company with extensive international operations.
We developed an anticorruption compliance program and counseling on individual compliance matters for multinational banks headquartered in Europe and Japan.
We counseled a U.S. defense contractor in the structuring of its payments to a European agent in order to comply with applicable anticorruption laws.
We represented a multinational technology company in connection with a voluntary disclosure under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
We counseled the U.S. subsidiary of a large European defense contractor on anticorruption issues in connection with payment of agents’ fees under a contract to supply defense products to a Latin American government.
We’ve provided advice to a U.S.-based agricultural company on the application of anticorruption laws to payments to a foreign government hostile to the United States, in order to obtain exit visas for certain of its employees under persecution by that government.

Government Contracting

The lawyer for a criminal defendant, who was charged with fraud and misrepresentations to government investigators in the pursuit of a number of government contracts in New York City, hired Jeff Belkin as a testifying expert on government contract issues. Mr. Belkin testified at the criminal trial and was qualified by the U.S. District Judge as an expert in the field of government contracts, without objection by the prosecution, particularly on the areas of qualifications for Veteran Owned Small Business (VOSB) and Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business (SDVOSB) status. While the defendant was convicted of all counts, both the prosecution and the defense quoted Mr. Belkin’s expert testimony to make their closing statements.
Recently, we worked with our white collar and immigration experts in responding to the visit by ICE inspectors to our client’s construction project, and addressed the E-Verify compliance issues arising from that inspection both with ICE and with the government customer agency.
We currently represent four defendants in a qui tam False Claims Act lawsuit alleging sales of products to the federal government that are claimed not to be compliant with the Trade Agreements Act. Our expertise in domestic source requirements in government procurement is unmatched. Just in this area, we have authored widely circulated articles, conducted internal investigations of manufacturing clients’ supply chain to address Buy American Act and Trade Agreements Act compliance issues, conducted seminars and trainings of sales staff and senior executives, traveled with clients on customer sales visits where American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and Buy American restrictions were a key issue, and defended False Claims Act investigations and lawsuits alleging noncompliance.
We currently represent the client in an ongoing DOJ and Federal Communication Commission (FCC) Inspector General investigation into fraud in the E-Rate program.
We served as counsel to a NASDAQ company in the first reported investigation by the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), General Services Administration (GSA) and DOJ into a contractor’s alleged violation of the False Claims Act based upon a purported false certification of business size.
We successfully resolved a highly publicized defective pricing investigation by GSA and DOJ into our manufacturing client’s compliance with pricing obligations arising under the GSA Schedule.
We counseled a publicly traded company in a federal investigation of alleged fraudulent billings in connection with federal highway projects.
We handled investigations by the SBA Inspector General into the accuracy of small business size representations.
We have handled and assisted in investigations by grand juries into alleged over-billing, bribery and contract fraud.
We defended a major agribusiness in a federal grand jury investigation of alleged antitrust violations in the sale of agricultural products through a federally administered international aid program.
We are defending a manufacturer in a federal grand jury investigation of a sale of allegedly defective products to Department of Defense.
We defended a Chicago-based parts remanufacturer in a federal grand jury investigation of alleged overbilling for reconditioning of parts for U.S. Navy ships and in related debarment proceedings.
We are defending a NYSE company in a state criminal investigation of an alleged procurement fraud involving a California port authority.
We defended a mortgage subsidiary of a major national life insurance company in connection with a federal grand jury investigation of a mortgage loan fraud related to a federally guaranteed mortgage loan program.
We represented a major wireless service provider in connection with the FCC’s auction of a spectrum and follow-on Antitrust Division investigation of alleged bid rigging in connection with the auction.
We represent a major information technology company in an investigation of fraud against the client by a former employee related to the performance of government contracts.
We recently advised a client on possible mandatory or voluntary disclosure issues arising out of allegations of kickbacks and improper payments by subcontractors.

Government Investigations & Securities and Commodities

We represent a bulge-bracket, multinational financial services company in numerous internal investigations, regulatory inquiries and related civil litigation concerning potential issues arising under the federal securities laws and SEC, Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and FINRA regulations, as well as numerous other state and federal laws and regulations.
We represent a financial services company in parallel investigations by federal and state regulators relating to its residential mortgage-backed securitization practices.
We represent a worldwide financial services provider in an internal investigation of potential violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act by an employee who attempted to broker deals with the Iranian government.
We’ve represented investment companies, broker-dealers, funds and numerous individuals in several high-profile insider trading investigations and prosecutions by the SEC, FINRA, DOJ and foreign regulators, including those stemming from the high-profile “expert networking” investigation.
We represented a senior executive in global parallel investigations by DOJ, the CFTC, the FSA and other regulators concerning the alleged manipulation of interbank lending rates.
We represented the general counsel of a NYSE-listed company in a parallel investigation by the SEC relating to a financial restatement issued by the company.
We represented a multinational financial services company in a forensic investigation concerning allegations that the company’s former employee misappropriated trade secrets for proprietary trading software.
We’ve represented companies and individuals in investigations by DOJ, the SEC, FINRA and state securities regulators concerning their participation in purported market manipulations, investment schemes and trading inquiries, including the recent wave of “layering” investigations.
We represented a financial services company in an investigation concerning federal and state pay-to-play laws.
We represented a Nationally Recognized Statistical Rating Organization in its examination by the SEC.
We’ve assisted clients in designing and implementing codes of ethics, disclosure policies, insider trading policies and training programs, whistleblower protections and audit committee policies pursuant to the Sarbanes-Oxley and Dodd Frank Acts.