Investigations FAQ

Engage outside investigators at the earliest credible signal of misconduct, regulatory inquiry, or material allegation — a whistleblower complaint, a subpoena or Wells notice, an audit finding, or an external report. Early engagement preserves privilege under Upjohn, secures volatile evidence, and gives the audit committee and counsel a credible record of independence.

We are former SEC enforcement attorneys, FBI special agents, DOJ trial attorneys, and Chief Compliance Officers of major multinationals — not generalists. Our findings withstand cross-examination and translate cleanly into Wells submissions and DOJ presentations. Our investigations have resulted in criminal charges against 100+ individuals.

We follow a defensible, privilege-protected protocol: scoping memo, preservation, evidence collection, targeted interviews, forensic and financial analysis, written findings, and remediation roadmap. We work under counsel direction, preserve attorney-client privilege, and issue Upjohn warnings.

We scope based on allegation complexity, custodian count, jurisdictional footprint, and regulatory exposure. Every engagement is scoped to the matter; we typically begin with a scoping phase that produces an investigation plan, preservation map, and budget for the substantive work before it proceeds. Contact us to discuss your situation.

We support clients before the SEC, DOJ, CFTC, FINRA, OCC, FRB, FDIC, Treasury (FinCEN and OFAC), DOC/BIS, State Department (DDTC), FTC, HHS-OIG, and parallel non-U.S. regulators including the UK SFO, FCA, and EU enforcement bodies.

We investigate cross-border bribery and corruption end-to-end — third-party due diligence, beneficial-ownership analysis, accounting-records reconstruction, and remediation testing — aligned with the DOJ/SEC FCPA Resource Guide and UK SFO guidance. Findings are calibrated to support DOJ self-disclosure, declination, or NPA/DPA negotiations.

We map transactions against OFAC sanctions programs, the EAR, and ITAR — testing screening, end-use, and end-user controls — and recommend disclosure strategy under OFAC and BIS voluntary self-disclosure policies. VSD under current guidance can result in penalty reductions of 50% or more.

We reconstruct the trading and information timeline — order tickets, position changes, communications, calendar entries, access logs — and test it against SEC Rule 10b-5, Section 16, and the Dirks/Salman tipper-tippee framework. Our team has investigated market manipulation schemes resulting in hundreds of millions in investor losses.

Treat every credible whistleblower allegation as a regulator-facing event — Dodd-Frank Section 21F and SOX Sections 806 and 1107 protect reporters, and the SEC has paid more than $2 billion in awards. Our protocol locks down evidence, opens an independent investigation under counsel, issues Upjohn warnings, and produces written findings credible to regulators and the audit committee.

We combine ledger-level analytics, Benford's-Law and outlier testing, journal-entry forensics, and interview evidence to identify schemes, quantify loss, and document methodology to ACFE and AICPA Statement on Standards for Forensic Services standards. Our team has addressed victim losses exceeding $1 billion.

We follow funds across bank wires, real estate, corporate structures, and blockchains using on-chain analytics, beneficial-ownership mapping, and cross-jurisdictional public-records research. Engagements support civil recovery, criminal forfeiture under 18 U.S.C. §§ 981–982, receivership, and Mareva/freezing-order applications.

Monitors are typically imposed by DPAs, NPAs, plea agreements, consent orders, or court orders when a regulator concludes internal compliance is not yet self-sustaining — the DOJ Benczkowski Memo and 2024 monitor-selection guidance set the benchmark. Our engagements include quarterly control testing, culture assessments, and reports to the court.

A proactive review benchmarking governance, internal controls, third-party risk, and culture against industry standards and the COSO ERM and DOJ Evaluation of Corporate Compliance Programs frameworks. Boards commission them before IPOs, after acquisitions, or when a director surfaces concerns short of formal allegations.

Our investigators are also testifying experts. We preserve evidence to forensic chain-of-custody standards, prepare expert reports under FRCP 26(a)(2), and testify in federal and state courts, AAA and JAMS arbitrations, and SEC and DOJ proceedings. Several team members have served as court-appointed special masters.