FCPA Flash – The Official Podcast of FCPA Professor

In this episode, Robin Lööf (a barrister practicing at Fountain Court Chambers in London) reflects on ten years of the U.K. Bribery Act. During the podcast, Lööf discusses the following topics: what is known and what is unknown after ten years of the Bribery Act; the impact of DPAs on Bribery Act enforcement including individual enforcement actions; and the long time periods often associated with Bribery Act enforcement.  

In this episode, Nicola Bonucci (Paul Hastings LLP and former Director for Legal Affairs for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) discusses the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions. Among the issues discussed are: (i) the false narrative that the FCPA (post 1998 amendments) “conforms” to the OECD Convention; (ii) whether the OECD Convention or its commentaries has any form of “legislative history”; (iii) the narrative often heard by the OECD (and others) that it is too difficult in certain jurisdictions to convict a business organization of a bribery related crime; (iv) whether the OECD prioritizes quantity of enforcement over quality of enforcement; (v) why anyone should care what non-U.S. experts think about the U.S. FCPA, U.S. law enforcement policies and practices, and U.S. jurisprudence.

In this episode, Matthew Galvin (Global Vice President, Ethics & Compliance at AB-InBev) talks about the company’s BrewRight compliance system including: the origins of BrewRight; what BrewRight is; and how it minimizes FCPA (and other) risk. Galvin also discusses whether companies that adopt similar compliance systems should be able to avail themselves of a “compliance defense.”

In this episode, Douglas Zolkind (Debevoise & Plimpton and former Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York who prosecuted FCPA trials involving Ng Lap Seng and Patrick Ho): (i) shares his experiences trying FCPA cases including the difference between “FCPA violations” and “FCPA violations that can be proven at trial”; (ii) discusses underappreciated aspects of DOJ FCPA enforcement; (iii) opines whether the government is vulnerable on some of its FCPA enforcement theories; and (iv) suggests a change to FCPA enforcement.

In this episode, Jane Shvets (Debevoise & Plimpton) discusses 2020 FCPA developments including: (i) FCPA relevant portions of the recently enacted National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021; (ii) whether the DOJ's "anti-piling" policy is indeed true in practice; and (iii) what the future may hold for FCPA enforcement.

In this episode, Philip Urofsky (Shearman & Sterling and former DOJ FCPA prosecutor) discusses 2020 FCPA developments including: (i) the impact COVID had on 2020 FCPA enforcement; and (ii) transparency and consistency in FCPA enforcement.