The SEC has for the first time invoked specific claw-back provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act against a company CEO that was not directly involved in the company’s fraud scheme. Maynard L. Jenkins, the former chief executive of CSK Auto Corporation was ordered to reimburse the company and shareholders over $4 million that he earned [...]

Sarbanes-Oxley’s ever expanding sphere of influence grew further in April when the Department of Labor ruled that private companies that perform work for public companies will now held accountable under SOX.
The ruling came after a complaint was filed with OSHA by an in-house attorney who worked for a publicly traded company (the attorney’s name and [...]

A great piece in the Wall Street Journal today discusses the dedicated efforts of a Mr. Harry Markopolos in trying to alert the Securities and Exchange Commission to the Bernard Madoff ponzi scheme as early as 2000.

Willbros Group, Inc. and its subsidiary, Willbros International, agreed to pay $32.3 million in a settlement with the Department of Justice and Securities and Exchange Commission to resolve allegations of FCPA violations. Of that

The CEO of Denver-based Grynberg Productions is trying a new strategy to escape possible FCPA violations: suing a bunch of his rivals. This month Jack Grynberg, the eponymous chairman of the oil company, sued British oil company BP, BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward, Former BP Chief Executive John Browne, Norway’s Statoil and others, accusing [...]

Will there ever be an end to the Oil-for-Food abuses? Flowserve Corporation announced last Thursday that it will pay nearly $10.6 million to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.S. Department of Justice for violating the United Nation’s Iraq Oil-for-Food humanitarian program. A Dutch and French-based subsidiary of the company, Flowserve [...]

For several years, Ernesto Tapanes was a simple, ordinary “oceanography survey consultant,” doing contracting work for the treasure-hunting firm Odyssey Marine Exploration Inc. One spring day in 2007, however, his life abruptly changed when he discovered an anomaly off the coast of Gibraltar. Upon further investigation, it turned out to be a sunken

The European engineering firm Siemens just learned that it might be fined as much as €4 billion (close to $6 billion) by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission as the result of a large bribery investigation that began in 2006. The number is about three times the amount of bribes that were uncovered [...]

William McGuire, former CEO of United Health, agreed to give back about $620 million to resolve a government investigation into whether or not he illegally backdated millions of stock options. Sure, this is a hefty sum, but the blow is softened when considering McGuire still floated home with a billion dollar golden parachute, even [...]

The former chief financial officer of Safenet Inc. pleaded guilty on Friday to backdating stock options for herself and the former CEO.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has been cracking down on General Counsels this year more than ever, according to an article released today by the National Law Journal. Experts say the increased prosecution comes from the SEC’s backlash after a proposed regulation in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act was revoked.

Textron has agreed to pay $4.6 million in fines for bribing officials of Suddam Hussein’s government in order to acquire Iraqi contracts through the United Nations’ Oil-for-Food program. The fines are divided into the amounts of $1.15 million and $3.5 million between the Department of Justice and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, respectively.
The [...]

The SEC announced the settlement of a civil lawsuit against an employee of IBM for aiding Dollar General Corporation’s accounting fraud. The final judgment ordered Kevin B. Collins to pay $95,000 for his role in assisting Dollar General’s violations of various SEC codes.
Collins allegedly proposed to Dollar General to push forward a $10 million [...]

After a five-week trial, former Brocade CEO Gregory L. Reyes was convicted by a federal court jury on 10 counts of conspiracy and fraud over illegal stock option backdating.
Mr. Reyes had been accused of intentionally changing the grant dates for hundreds of stock option awards without disclosing the move to investors. Sentencing is scheduled [...]

The Senate Finance and Judiciary committees have released the results of their investigation into the SEC’s firing of a former staff lawyer, Gary Aguirre, in September 2005.
Mr. Aguirre had been leading the SEC investigation into possible illegal insider trading by large hedge fund Pequot Capital that is run by Arthur J. Samberg.
Aguirre was fired after [...]

Ryan Brant, the former CEO of Take-Two Interactive Software (maker of popular video games such as “Grand Theft Auto”), has been sentenced to five years of probation for his role in overseeing the fraudulent backdating of stock options.
Mr. Brant pleaded guilty in back February. He had been facing up to four years in prison [...]

Delta & Pine Co. (a cotton seed producer) has reached a settlement with the SEC to pay $300,000 over charges that it illegally bribed Turkish government officials in order to get documentation that reportedly would allow the company to operate in the country.
According to the SEC, Delta & Pine (which has since been acquired by [...]

Today, in a Denver courtroom packed with former US West and Qwest employees who lost their savings in the bankruptcy of the company, a federal judge sentenced the former chief executive who presided over the company’s demise to six years in prison.
Judge Edward Nottingham also ordered the ex-CEO, Joseph Nacchio, to pay a $19 [...]

The SEC announced yesterday that it unanimously approved a new auditing standard and other measures intended to increase the accuracy of financial reports while reducing unnecessary costs, particularly for smaller public companies.
The Commission is hoping that this new management guidance, Auditing Standard No. 5 (which replaces Auditing Standard No. 2), will make Section 404 [...]

The U.S. Justice Department is conducting a criminal inquiry of nearly a dozen oil and oil services companies, focusing on potentially illegal payments to customs agents who provided freight forwarding and other services that extended to Nigeria. The SEC is investigating as well.
According to Dow Jones, eleven oil and oil service firms received a [...]

Does anyone need further proof that the private and personal lives of CEOs are now fair game and are being intertwined into discussions around compliance, ethics and governance?
Okay then, here you go…
First of all, CNBC is reporting this morning that Jimmy Cayne, the CEO of Bear Stearns, is being investigated…
Investigated for what? Fraud? Insider [...]

Office Depot is feeling the heat surrounding its recent warning to investors that sales were down due to a weak economy. The problem? It seems that some Wall Street analysts were privy to the information a week earlier.
According to the analysts, the warning they received from the Office Depot Investor Relations Department re-emphasized earlier alerts [...]

From our “in-case-you-missed-it-while-out-on-your- holidays-during-July” file the DOJ announced gleefully that four former executives with computer networking and security vendor Enterasys Networks Inc. had been sentenced to long prison terms for their roles in accounting fraud at the company.
The executives were originally convicted on conspiracy and fraud charges during a December 2006 trial.
In U.S. District Court [...]

The Wall Street Journal and other media outlets are reporting a large amount of suspicious option trading in advance of the Hilton-buyout by Blackstone Group announced on July 3rd.
As Dow Jones reported:
Traders booked massive profits in positions on Hilton Hotels Corp. as the stock surged 26% after the company said Blackstone Group will buy [...]

Just after being ordered to cut a $2.3 million check for a sex discrimination lawsuit, banking giant UBS is looking at even more trouble ahead. Regulators in the State of Massachusetts have accused UBS of “dishonest” and “unethical” practices in their dealing with hedge fund advisors (and by “dishonest and unethical practices,” they mean “bribery”).
A [...]