by Eric Volkman, Erin Brown Jones, and Bridget R. Reineking

On November 29, 2017, Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein announced that the US Department of Justice (DOJ) has implemented a permanent, revised version of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) Pilot Program.[1] The Pilot Program — which was launched as a one-year trial in April 2016 by then-Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division (and now Latham partner) Leslie Caldwell — was extended indefinitely in April 2017 to allow DOJ to evaluate the program’s efficacy.[2] Rosenstein announced that the enhanced policy — now called the FCPA Corporate Enforcement Policy (PDF: 51 KB) (FCPA Policy) — will be incorporated into the United States Attorneys’ Manual (USAM). Like its predecessor, the FCPA Policy aims to encourage companies to make timely and voluntary disclosures of wrongdoing under the FCPA, while providing additional concrete incentives rewarding corporations for cooperation.

This policy announcement is likely the first of several DOJ policy changes and/or enhancements under the new administration. As detailed in Latham’s October 2017 Client Alert (PDF: 93.58 KB), Rosenstein recently announced that DOJ was reviewing a wide range of existing corporate enforcement policies, including the Pilot Program, DOJ’s policy on “Individual Accountability for Corporate Wrongdoing” (the Yates Memo), and other DOJ policies and memoranda — with the intention of ultimately incorporating the revised policies into the USAM. Continue reading →