Prosecuting Corporations: NOT High on Administration’s To Do List

March 8, 2018

After a year of conjecture about the Trump administration’s approach to white-collar crime, the Justice Department has reinforced speculation of a relatively hands-off approach to corporate prosecutions. While asserting that it will hold individuals accountable for corporate criminal behavior, Justice Department leaders have stated that they will not “employ the hammer of criminal enforcement to extract unfair settlements” from corporate entities. In pursuit of that strategy, at the end of last year, federal prosecutors announced an initiative for leniency in Foreign Corrupt Practices Act cases where a corporation voluntarily discloses conduct in violation of the FCPA and cooperates with the government. Recently, the government displayed an intention to apply this policy outside of the FCPA context as well. [...]

Attorneys

Robert J. Anello