Securities Enforcement and Litigation

Claudius Sokenu, a former federal regulator, is a partner in the litigation practice group where his practice focuses on representing multinational public and private companies, hedge funds, private equity firms, broker-dealers, investment banks, investment advisers, accounting firms, and their officers, directors, and employees in complex commercial litigations, securities enforcement actions and litigations, including class actions and FINRA arbitrations, white collar criminal defense, derivative actions, congressional investigations, internal investigations, and corporate crisis management. Claudius has extensive experience in handling delicate high-profile matters that require concurrent representation in the civil, criminal, and political spheres.

Claudius is widely recognized as a leading Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) practitioner. He regularly represents domestic and multinational companies and their employees in all aspects of FCPA internal investigations, enforcement actions, and compliance matters before the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the United States Department of Justice (DOJ), the United Kingdom’s Serious Fraud Office, and other civil and criminal authorities in the United States and abroad. He has represented Boards of Directors, Audit Committees, officers, senior management and employees of multinational companies in anticorruption investigations in dozens of countries and on virtually every continent.

Earlier in his career, Claudius served in the Washington, DC office of the SEC in the Division of Enforcement, on the Honors Program, first as a Staff Attorney (1998-2000) and later as Senior Counsel (2000-2001), where he was responsible for handling a broad range of the SEC's domestic and international enforcement matters, including investigations involving accounting fraud, insider trading, initial public offerings, illicit payments under the FCPA, investment companies and investment advisers, market manipulation, and broker-dealer misconduct. He was also a member of the Enforcement Division’s FCPA Working Group, which is now known as the FCPA Unit, one of the five specialized units created by the Enforcement Division in 2009. As a member of the Enforcement Division, he handled a number of high-profile enforcement matters, including the first-ever joint FCPA enforcement action with the DOJ against KPMG and Baker Hughes, Inc.; an FCPA enforcement action against a chief financial officer of a publicly traded oil services company; FCPA enforcement action against a former controller of an oilfield services company; and the SEC’s enforcement action against Goldman Sachs & Co. for violations of the federal securities laws in connection with the initial public offerings of PetroChina Company Limited, China Telecom Hong Kong Limited, Chinadotcom Corp., and Giga Media Limited for which Goldman Sachs served as underwriter.

Claudius is an Adjunct Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center in Washington, DC where he teaches advanced level securities enforcement and litigation courses. Claudius has lectured and published extensively on securities enforcement and litigation matters and has been quoted in the financial press on a variety of securities law issues.

Among many other awards, in January 2011, Claudius was named one of seven “Best FCPA Lawyers Outside the Beltway” by Main Justice, an independent news organization that covers the DOJ. In February 2011, Claudius was awarded the 2011 Outstanding Outside Counsel award by the National Bar Association, Commercial Law Section. In December 2010, he was named to Diversity & The Bar’s “Leading Law Firm Rainmakers” list. In February 2007, Claudius was named to Securities Law360's "10 Under 40," a list of 10 lawyers under the age of 40 who have demonstrated an outstanding breadth of knowledge and experience in the securities enforcement and litigation field. In 2005, the City Bar Association of New York appointed Claudius to serve on the Task Force on the Role of Attorneys in Corporate Governance. In 2003, the Minority Corporate Counsel Association honored Claudius as an Outstanding Outside Corporate Counsel. In 2001, the Association of the Bar of the City of New York honored Claudius for outstanding pro bono work in connection with a petition for a writ of certiorari to the Supreme Court of the United States.

He earned his LL.B with Upper Second Class Honors (magna cum laude equivalent) from the London South Bank University, an LL.M from the University of London’s London School of Economics and King’s College London, and an LL.M in Securities and Financial Regulations from Georgetown University Law Center, Washington, DC.

Securities Enforcement and Litigation Representative Matters

• Lead counsel for Ernst & Young Global Limited in a number of securities class actions in the Southern District of New York (SDNY) stemming from the Madoff Ponzi scheme scandal.
• Lead counsel for Avon Products, Inc. in an ongoing FCPA internal investigation.
• Lead counsel for a California-based hedge fund in a civil and criminal investigation alleging potential violations of the antifraud provisions of the federal securities laws in connection with a collateralized debt offering.
• Lead counsel for a private equity firm and its executives in a civil and criminal investigation involving allegations of insider trading in connection with the proposed leveraged buyout of TNS Inc.
• Lead counsel for a senior management level executive in the industry-wide FCPA investigation of the medical devices industry by the SEC and DOJ.
• Lead counsel for Bank of America in the civil (SEC) and criminal (SDNY) investigation of Impath, Inc. for accounting fraud in which the SEC and the United States Attorney's Office for the SDNY declined to institute charges against Bank of America, SEC v. Saad, 05 CV 03308 (S.D.N.Y. filed Mar. 29, 2005).
• Successfully led the representation of Global Industries, Ltd. in an industry-wide civil and criminal FCPA investigation arising from the Panalpina Group's operations in West Africa, where the DOJ and SEC declined to press charges against Global Industries while levying fines and penalties of US$236.5 million on seven other oil and oil services companies.
• Successfully represented TV Azteca S.A. de C.V. in the first-ever up-the-ladder reporting case under Section 307 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002. SEC v. TV Azteca S.A. de C.V., Civ. No. 1:05-CV-00004 (D.D.C. filed Jan. 4, 2005).
• Successfully represented, in the first matter identified by the SEC as part of its “subprime” initiative, the former chairman and chief executive officer of First BanCorp of Puerto Rico, Angel Alvarez-Perez, in securities and derivative actions. Fox v. First BanCorp., Civ. No. 05-2148 (GAG) 2006 WL 4128534 (D.P.R. Nov. 6, 2006) and In re First BanCorp Derivative Litigation, 465 F. Supp. 2d 112 (D.P.R. 2006).
• Led the representation of Northern Trust Corporation in connection with the SEC and New York State Attorney General's industry-wide investigation of the auction rate securities market.
• Successfully led the representation of three hedge funds in the SEC's investigation of the Private Investment in Public Equity industry involving, among others, allegations of insider trading, frontrunning, market manipulation, and trading in unregistered securities SEC declined to recommend enforcement action against two of the three hedge funds.
• Successfully represented Ernst & Young LLP in connection with its audit of Allied Deals, Inc., a privately owned company that was accused of orchestrating a US$600 million international Ponzi scheme in which several global financial institutions were allegedly defrauded. Sterling National Bank v. Ernst & Young LLP, 2008 NY. Misc. LEXIS 6997 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. Dec. 1, 2008).
• Co-authored the Securities law arguments of the brief before the Second Circuit on behalf of well known investment banker Frank Quottrone.  (United States v. Quattrone, 2d Cir. 2006).
• Successfully represented CIBC World Markets Corp. in obtaining dismissal of a fraud claim, in which the New York State Supreme Court, Appellate Division, First Department, ruled for the first time that a clearing broker does not owe customers of its introducing broker a fiduciary duty. Goldstein v. CIBC World Mkts. Corp., 776 N.Y.S. 2d 12 (1^st Dep't 2004).
• Successfully represented a senior executive of insurance giant American International Group (AIG) in a civil (SEC) and criminal (SDNY) accounting and securities fraud investigation stemming from, among other things, the near-collapse of the derivatives market.
• Successfully represented a former chief operating officer of a Fortune 20 company in an SEC and SDNY investigation alleging accounting fraud.
• Successfully represented, in the industry-wide SEC, New York Attorney General, and SDNY civil and criminal investigation of the mutual fund industry, a fund manager in connection with allegations of market timing, late trading, and insider trading.
• Successfully represented, in the first FCPA prosecution stemming from an antitrust investigation, a senior officer of Parker Hannifin Corporation in a criminal investigation by the DOJ regarding allegations of bribery, bid-rigging, price-fixing, and market allocation in the marine oil and gas hose industry.
• Represented Arthur Andersen LLP in connection with a securities class action involving claims of accounting fraud by Global Crossing Ltd In re Global Crossing Ltd. Sec. Litig. (S.D.N.Y. 2004).
• Lead counsel for two hedge funds, Q Funding, L.P., and R² Investments, LDC, in obtaining a dismissal in a case involving settlement payment for securities transactions. PHP Liquidating, LLCv. Robbins, 291 B.R. 592 (D. Del. 2003).
• Represented certain issuers in the initial public offering allocation cases.  In re Initial Public Offering Sec. Litig., 241 F. Supp. 2d 281 (S.D.N.Y. 2003).
• Represented a foreign brokerage firm in an independent investigation involving potential violations of the FCPA.
• Successfully represented a major international insurance company in a civil and criminal investigation involving allegations of violations of the FCPA.
• Represented an investment banking firm in connection with the civil and criminal investigation of Enron Corp.