Legal Update
26 October 2010
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
The Dodd-Frank Act’s new whistleblower provision—which entices would-be whistleblowers who provide “original information” leading to a recovery of $1 million or more in any resulting enforcement action with up to 30 percent of the total amount collected—has become a cause for concern for the architects of corporate compliance programs. This “whistleblower bounty program”—tucked away in Section 922 of the Dodd-Frank Act—gives employees a strong incentive to bypass internal corporate compliance processes in favor of contacting the SEC directly when they are cognizant of infractions and misconduct, prompting some commentators to question whether the Dodd-Frank whistleblower program is at odds with the Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) objectives of strengthening internal corporate compliance programs.
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Media Coverage
26 October 2010
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Portfolio Media
Q&A article discusses Chicago Litigation partner Vincent Connelly’s career and his experience as a litigator.
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Legal Update
25 October 2010
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
US importers have long been subject to civil penalties for violating US trade law. However, with the recent indictment of 11 individuals and 6 corporations for allegedly conspiring to illegally import goods into the United States, the US government may be signaling a sea-change in its enforcement strategy by subjecting trade law violators to severe criminal penalties as well.
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Legal Update
14 October 2010
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
A technology company was held to a higher standard of competence in implementing its preservation obligations by the District Court of the Southern District of New York, which imposed sanctions on the company for discovery violations in its defense of a lawsuit filed by two former employees. The Court’s order is a reminder that the departure of an employee is a situation fraught with potential electronic discovery challenges, that in-house counsel has a continuing responsibility to monitor the implementation of legal holds, and that any misrepresentations of discovery efforts (even if not intentional) can have negative consequences.
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Media Coverage
11 October 2010
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Portfolio Media
Shannon Thyme Klinger has joined Mayer Brown's Washington, DC office as a partner.
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News Release
11 October 2010
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Mayer Brown
Mayer Brown, a leading global law firm, announced today that former federal prosecutor Michael Volkov has joined the firm’s Washington, DC office as a partner in the Litigation practice. He joins the firm after nearly 30 years in diverse government positions and private practice, and focuses on white collar defense, internal investigations and government relations.
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Media Coverage
11 October 2010
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Portfolio Media
Former federal prosecutor Michael Volkov has joined the firm’s Washington, DC office as a partner in the Litigation practice.
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Newsletter
30 September 2010
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Mayer Brown Newsletter
Scenario A large pharmaceutical company recalls a product after serious safety-related concerns are raised. The company subsequently is faced with multiple lawsuits in state courts throughout the country. In-house counsel anticipates that plaintiffs’ counsel will propound broad discovery requests seeking, among other things, electronically stored information (“ESI”) from multiple custodians located in numerous e-mail accounts, databases and back-up tapes. In-house counsel is concerned with the prospect of complying with the e-discovery rules in each of these state courts.
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Legal Update
20 September 2010
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
The Alien Tort Statute (ATS), which was enacted by the first Congress in 1789, has served as the primary vehicle in recent decades for class action lawsuits by foreign plaintiffs alleging human rights violations abroad by US and foreign corporations.
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Legal Update
16 September 2010
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
On September 9, 2010, Magistrate Judge Paul W. Grimm of the District of Maryland issued an 89-page opinion addressing a motion for terminating and other sanctions arising out of the defendants’ intentional destruction of evidence that includes a detailed analysis of the current state of the law relating to preservation and spoliation. The opinion may have important implications for litigants beleaguered by the escalating costs of implementing expansive preservation programs relating to electronically stored information (ESI) and concerned about potential spoliation claims.
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Media Coverage
13 September 2010
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Financial Times
London Litigation partner Andrew Legg quoted in an article about the new UK Bribery Act, which will come into force in April 2011.
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Legal Update
8 September 2010
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
Perhaps reflecting the rapid pace of FCPA enforcement actions, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) has issued its second Opinion Procedure Release in as many months, detailing the agency’s Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) enforcement policy regarding “certain specified, prospective—not hypothetical—conduct.”
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Legal Update
1 September 2010
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
For the second time in 2010, and only the tenth time in the past five years, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) has issued an Opinion Procedure Release detailing the agency’s Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) enforcement policy regarding “certain specified, prospective—not hypothetical—conduct.”
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Newsletter
31 August 2010
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Mayer Brown Newsletter
large manufacturer is served with a class action complaint alleging that the company knowingly produced products that were unsafe in certain circumstances. In-house counsel meets to discuss and identify electronically stored information (ESI) that may be responsive to the complaint and learns that one potentially relevant source of information is employee text messages.
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Legal Update
29 July 2010
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (the “Dodd-Frank Act”) includes enhanced corporate whistleblower protections that affect publicly traded and non-publicly traded companies. Among other things, the Dodd-Frank Act creates a new whistleblower cause of action that allows individuals to share in SEC-imposed sanctions and bring claims for double back pay in federal court up to 10 years after the alleged retaliatory conduct.
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Mayer Brown Newsletter
Scenario A large pharmaceutical company maintains data related to its research and development in several proprietary, structured databases. The information contained in the database is regularly updated with results of new trials. The company receives a subpoena from a regulatory agency requesting documents related to clinical trials that were completed in advance of releasing a new product. To fully respond to the subpoena, information maintained in those databases must be collected, reviewed and potentially produced.
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Legal Update
23 July 2010
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
One key provision of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank) is a new bounty provision that will undoubtedly lead to more FCPA, accounting fraud, and trading investigations. The provision relates to Congress’ stated desire to increase regulatory enforcement remedies available to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
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Mayer Brown LLP, a leading global law firm, announced today that the 2010 edition of Legal 500 United States ranks the firm’s practices in 22 categories, including top-tier rankings in four categories: Litigation – Supreme Court & Appellate; Tax, Domestic – Central; Tax Controversy; and Technology – Outsourcing. The publication also lists 16 Mayer Brown partners as “Leading Lawyers” in their practice categories.
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Legal Update
29 June 2010
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
On June 22, 2010, the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit ruled in United States ex rel Miller v. Bill Harbert International Construction, Inc., No. 08-5390 (D.C. Cir. June 22, 2010) (Harbert), that claims added in the amended complaint filed by the government at the time of its intervention in a lawsuit brought under the qui tam provisions of the False Claims Act (FCA) were time-barred under the FCA’s statute of limitations.
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News Release
16 June 2010
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Mayer Brown LLP, a leading global law firm, announced today that 126 of its attorneys are ranked in the 2010 edition of Chambers USA: America’s Leading Lawyers for Business, including 40 who achieved a top-band ranking or higher in 27 nationwide and/or state categories.
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Legal Update
15 June 2010
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
Wenn deutsche Unternehmen personenbezogene Daten an Unternehmen außerhalb der EU übermitteln, so müssen sie die strengen Anforderungen des Bundesdatenschutzgesetzes erfüllen. Für einen zulässigen Datentransfer müssen sie daher regelmäßig Maßnahmen treffen, um ein angemessenes Datenschutzniveau beim Empfänger sicherzustellen. When German companies transfer personal data to companies outside the EU then they have to fulfill the stringent requirements of the Federal Data Protection Act. Therefore, in order to ensure a permissible data transfer they must regularly take measures in order to ensure a suitable data protection level by the recipient.
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Mayer Brown Legal Update
On May 26, 2010, in advance of the United States Sentencing Commission’s public hearing regarding statutory mandatory minimums, US Attorney General Eric H. Holder, Jr., revealed that on May 19, 2010, his office issued new, department-wide guidance for federal prosecutors related to policies on the charging, plea negotiating and sentencing of federal crimes. The new policy specifically emphasizes that all charging decisions, plea agreements and sentencing requests must be based on, and informed by, a “individualized assessment” of the specific facts and circumstances of each particular case and defendant.
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Mayer Brown Newsletter
A large corporation is served with a complaint accusing it of participating in a price-fixing conspiracy. Multiple discovery requests follow seeking electronically stored information (ESI). In-house counsel speaks with the company’s IT department to estimate the scale of the review and is disturbed by the sheer number of files to be reviewed. How can a meaningful review be accomplished in a reasonable time frame in a cost-effective way?
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