John T. Floyd is Board Certified in Criminal Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization and is rated as a Super lawyer in Thomson Reuters prominent list of outstanding lawyers. He has successfully represented top executives and leading business people under investigation for allegations of serious criminal conduct and regulatory violations with criminal implications.
The John T Floyd Law Firm often works with corporate in-house counsel conducting internal investigations and conflict representation; representing individual members of companies facing potential personal criminal liability. Mr. Floyd has represented white collar clients ranging from highly successful entrepreneurs to top executives of multinational companies and understands the unusual zeal, and at times misconduct, that often accompanies the high profile investigations and prosecutions.
In 1939 sociologist Edwin Sutherland defined white collar crime as “a crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status in the course of his occupation.”
Given the wide range of crimes treated as “white collar” today Sutherland’s definition seems inadequate. At its most basic level, white collar crime refers to financially motivated crimes that do not involve violence. The term is generally used to denote crimes committed by people from a high economic status (business people, professionals or people who are placed in a position of trust), crimes that are economic in nature and involve large financial losses, or crimes that are committed by business entities or large corporations.
A professor of accountancy at Brigham Young University, W. Steve Albrecht, places the economic loss to white collar crime at somewhere near $200 billion a year.
Given the huge financial losses suffered as a result of white collar crimes the Department of Justice has announced that white collar investigations and prosecutions will be treated as one of the top priorities and will be punished severely. The DOJ has also indicated a policy of whistle blowers and corporate snitches to aid in its policy.
White collar criminal suspects are normally professionals, without experience dealing with law enforcement agents or the federal criminal courts. These individuals often feel overwhelmed when confronted by investigators because, at a moment’s notice, their livelihood, reputation, and freedom are at stake.
In order to appear cooperative, many professionals will submit to interviews with FBI agents or other federal criminal investigators without a lawyer.
This is significant mistake that could dramatically effect your ability to defend yourself. Criminal suspects often have nothing to gain and everything to lose by talking to federal agents. Even making false statements in response to embarrassing questions can result in federal felony charges of making false statements to federal agent.
Federal agents are trained in interviews tactics that encourage individuals to cooperate and talk. Do not be fooled by statements like: “If you haven’t done anything wrong you don’t need a lawyer,” “I am just trying to close this investigation,” “if you have nothing to hide you don’t need a lawyer,” or any other psychological ploy to get a suspect talking.
White collar crime trials are complex. An ordinary criminal trial may take only a day or two to complete and involve testimony from just a few witnesses. In white collar crime prosecutions, however, the government makes its case as difficult as possible, overwhelming the jury with a barrage of physical exhibits, complicated charts, electronic evidence such as emails, volumes of financial records, and dozens of witnesses, including professional experts who make a living testifying for government prosecutors.
This prosecutorial strategy is often designed to confuse and mislead the jury. They wear juries down with weeks of hard-to-understand testimony and difficult-to-comprehend financial records. Government prosecutors want the jury to presume guilt based on the sheer weight and volume of mostly irrelevant evidence, creating a “smell” of wrongdoing. But, this is the very flaw in the government’s case that a skilled defense attorney can spot and use to his advantage.
John T Floyd understands that many white collar cases are the result of accounting errors, billing mistakes or business deals gone bad. Mr. Floyd understands that just because an investor, business, or even the government itself lost money does not necessarily mean criminal intent. Mr. Floyd is proud to help his clients fight against white collar prosecutions that are typically tenuous, circumstantial, or based on hearsay statements of those who have an ax to grind or stand to benefit from the prosecution.
To understand how complex fraud cases can be, let’s look at bank fraud.
The U.S. Justice Department’s Criminal Division Fraud Section handles bank fraud prosecutions. The Fraud Section has published its own manual for the prosecution of financial institution fraud cases entitled Financial Institution Fraud Federal Prosecution Manual (1994) (FIF Manual) which is utilized by all U.S. Attorneys’ Offices across the country.
AUSAs utilize another resource manual known as the Criminal Resource Manual which contains information on all types of financial institution fraud crimes, including the laws used to prosecute bank fraud. To understand how complex AUSAs can make FIF (white collar crimes) prosecutions, below is a list of related offenses used in bank fraud prosecutions:
U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch recently announced that the Justice Department will be placing a much greater emphasis on white collar crime prosecutions, particularly bank fraud. But as white collar crime expert William K. Black said in a September 11, 2015 piece for Campaign For America’s Future, the Justice Department has not trained its AUSAs and the FBI how to “understand, detect, investigate, and prosecute the ‘accounting control frauds’ that caused the financial crisis” that nearly destroyed the nation’s economic system.
As criminal defense attorneys, we see many problems and a trove of flaws that will inevitably fall out of the Justice Department’s new crack down on white collar crime, especially those connected to large corporations and financial institutions. Many financial institution executives, as well as lower level employees, will be wrongfully targeted for investigation simply because of the widespread nature of the violations. Their careers, reputations, savings, and families will be ruined because the Department is now trying to make up for a failed prosecutorial policy that allowed many true bank fraudsters to walk away from their wrongdoing during the 2008 economic meltdown. We feel that many innocent executives will now pay the price for that failure.
Black called attention to the “paramount concern” the Justice Department’s top criminal prosecutor, Lanny Breuer, now has about fraud epidemics in our financial institutions.
But, if AG Lynch sticks to her new policy, the days of banks and their executives being “too big to prosecute” are over.
While we recognize that fraud is a serious problem in our financial institutions, we question whether the problem reaches “epidemic proportions.” It sounds more like a witch hunt that will inevitably lead to a lot of innocent or tangentially involved, minor participants being prosecuted as “white collar criminals” in order to fulfill a policy pledge.
Still, the Financial Crimes Section of the FBI now has a green light to focus its financial crimes investigations on corporate fraud, securities and commodities fraud, mass marketing fraud, health care fraud, mortgage fraud, financial institution fraud, mail and wire fraud, and money laundering. All of the white collar crimes carry harsh penalties.
For example, a conviction for mail or wire fraud can result in a sentence of up to 20 years can be imposed in addition to hefty fines. An individual can be fined up to $250,000 while an organization can be fined up to $350,000. Punishment is enhanced if the victim is a financial institution or if the fraud is committed in relation to a natural disaster. In either case, the defendant can be sentenced to a term of not more than 30 years, and face a fine up to $1 million. A defendant may also receive probation, or have a term of supervised release tacked on to his prison sentence. Special assessment, restitution, and forfeiture orders are routine in the sentencing scheme.
Another example of renewed focus in white collar investigations and prosecutions is money laundering cases.
There are two federal money laundering statutes: 18 U.S.C. §§ 1956 and 1957.
Of the two, Section 1956 is the one most often used to prosecute money laundering offenses. The statute prohibits four kinds of money laundering. Each can occur only in connection with what the statute defines as “specified unlawful activities” (SUA).
Section 1957 prohibits depositing or spending more than $10,000 of the proceeds from Section 1956 SUA. In short, money laundering has been defined as the act of transferring illegally obtained money through people or accounts so that its original source cannot be trace.
Section 1956 carries a penalty of not more than 20 years while Section 1957 carries a penalty of not more than 10 years. Violations of these two statutes may implicate other federal statutes, such as RICO which involves additional 20-year felonies. Violations of these two statutes may also involve conspiracies to commit separate federal offenses punishable by imprisonment of not more than five years.
Beyond the traditional white collar crimes, the FBI is also instrumental in investigating what it calls “high tech crimes” which include cyber-based terrorism, espionage, computer intrusions, and cyber fraud.
Historically, white collar crimes were committed through paperwork. Today, they are committed with a computer involving the Internet. This has spawned what is generally referred to as “cybercrimes”—a criminal activity associated with information technology’s infrastructure, including illegal access (unauthorized access), illegal data interception or interference (unauthorized damaging, deletion, deterioration, alteration or suppression of computer data), systems interference (interfering with the functioning of a computer system), misuse of devices, forgery (ID theft), and electronic fraud.
In brief, cybercrimes involve activity in which a computer, network or the internet is the source, tool, target, or place of a crime—including activity such as fraud, hacking, copyright infringement, child pornography and child grooming.
White collar and cybercrime are usually indicted and prosecuted at the Federal level because of the interstate nature of these offenses. Possible penalties for these offenses can include incarceration for a significant number of years to life imprisonment, generally determined by the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines. There are also fines for restitution, court costs, and damages suffered by the victims of these offenses.
In addition to the criminal sanctions, a defendant convicted of these crimes can face potential civil litigation from private businesses or corporate entities trying to recover their economic loss.
The law is forever changing with respect to white collar and cybercrimes. These kinds of offenses frequently require criminal defense attorneys to use “forensic experts” and experienced investigators to fight the charges. Forensic experts are able to examine a defendant’s computer hard drive, and after careful analysis, can offer possible defenses. Investigators, including skilled CPAs, are able to research the volumes of paperwork and documents associated with these cases to determine the validity of what the Government is charging.
Corruption charges against state or local officials, on the other hand, often involve videotaped surveillance of charged criminal transactions, electronic intercepts, GPS tracking, cellphone pinging, volumes of incriminating documents, banking statements, and eyewitness testimony. Federal prosecutors will often dump huge amounts of discovery documents and information upon defense attorney in corruption cases to force them into cumbersome review, investigations, and the hiring of skilled experts to examine the maze of documentary evidence.
The most common white collar crimes are:
Regardless of whether you are facing serious white collar or cybercrime charges in federal or state court, the consequences of a conviction can impact the rest of your life.
If you hope to avoid incarceration, heavy fines, and a lasting stain on your permanent record, you will need an aggressive, intelligent and innovative defense. The right attorney can be the difference between suffering a lengthy period of incarceration or avoiding criminal charges altogether. You need a lawyer who understands the intricacies of white collar and cybercrime criminal defense, and who has extensive experience successfully representing clients facing these kinds of charges.
One of the typical features of a white-collar crime is that you will often be notified by regulatory agents or criminal investigators that you, or your company, are under investigation. This allows an early and aggressive investigation and defense strategy with the potential ability to prevent the government from bringing criminal charges, protecting your reputation and that of your business.
Because white-collar crimes can be so multi-layered and difficult to navigate, it is common for individuals to feel overwhelmed by the allegations. It is our goal to take this burden off the individual and begin a proper investigation and defensive strategy so that you can get back to business and do what you do best.
A simple Google search will yield hundreds of lawyers in Texas. But of these, John T. Floyd is one of the select who is board certified in criminal law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization. Moreover, Mr. Floyd is nationally recognized expert in criminal law, and is backed by a record of countless successful cases.
For more than two decades, Mr. Floyd has protected the rights of individuals and businesses charged with crimes in Texas and federal courts. In his 20 years of litigating cases before state and federal courts, John T. Floyd has gained a firsthand understanding of the importance of a thorough investigation, extensive planning and the intelligent use of knowledgeable experts. If you are looking for an attorney with experience, talent, and the track record to prove it, look no further than the John T. Floyd Law Firm.
Contact us as soon as possible by sending a confidential email to jfloyd@johntfloyd.com or calling 713-224-0101. Let John T. Floyd and his team start fighting for you today.
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