Joel M. Cohen

Joel M. Cohen is a partner in the New York office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher.  He is a member of the firm’s White Collar Defense and Investigations, Securities Litigation, Commercial Litigation and Antitrust Practice Groups.

Mr. Cohen, a former federal prosecutor and experienced trial lawyer, has led or participated in over twenty criminal and civil trials in federal and state courts.  Mr. Cohen regularly acts for clients in a broad range of criminal and civil matters.  He is equally comfortable leading confidential investigations, managing crises, or advocating in court proceedings.  His experience includes securities and financial institution litigation, class actions, product liability, market manipulation, anti-corruption, money laundering, and forfeiture, with a particular focus on international disputes and discovery. 

Mr. Cohen has participated in some of the most high-profile matters in the United States, including the summary judgment obtained for Citi in a class action seeking over $13 billion in damages for its alleged role in the Parmalat collapse.  Mr. Cohen won a seven-week jury trial for AllianceBernstein in which the Florida state pension fund attempted to recover $3.2 billion in losses sustained in Enron and other stocks, and successfully defended the same client in other significant Enron-related litigations, one of which resulted in an award of attorney’s fees and costs for his client.

His recent engagements include:  obtaining summary judgment for for the hedge fund, Wynnefield Capital, in the defense against an SEC insider trading action that has been closely followed in legal and media circles; representing several Fortune 100 companies in global regulatory investigations relating to corporate fraud, corruption/FCPA issues, sanctions issues, and insider trading concerns; convincing the SEC to decline prosecution of a major accounting firm for alleged violations of the auditor independence rules; convincing the SEC to decline to charge a public company’s general counsel with insider trading; leading FCPA/anti-corruption investigations and regulatory issues for two major oil and gas service companies, involving reviews in over a dozen countries, on five continents; and, defending the former head of CDO trading at a top global bank in connection with several related criminal and regulatory and civil litigations. He has designed crisis management and global anti-corruption programs for financial institutions and advised clients in sensitive corruption investigations and transactional due diligence inquiries. He has represented audit and special committees of public companies and private company boards of directors in connection with allegations of wrongdoing.  He also has represented, including at trial, tobacco and firearms producers in product liability actions.

Mr. Cohen is committed to pro bono work.  He serves on or acts as outside counsel to several prominent non-profit entities.  He successfully led a team of Gibson Dunn attorneys in representing all plaintiffs in a high-profile immigration civil rights case (Barrera v. Boughton) in Connecticut federal court, which resulted in the largest settlement in history for such claims, for which the firm has been awarded the National Legal Aid & Defender Association’s 2010 Beacon of Justice Award, and The New York Times noted the accomplishment in an editorial.

Mr. Cohen previously was the Head of the U.S. Litigation & Dispute Resolution Practice at Clifford Chance, where he practiced from 2004 to 2009.  From 1999 to 2004, he practiced with Greenberg Traurig.  From 1992 to 1999, he served as Assistant United States Attorney in the Eastern District of New York, supervising the Business/Securities Fraud Unit, where he received numerous awards from the Department of Justice and law enforcement agencies.  His efforts in one celebrated investigation are the focus of a motion picture about to be directed by Martin Scorsese.  He was an adviser to OECD in connection with the effort to prohibit corruption in international transactions and was the first Department of Justice legal liaison advisor to the French Ministry of Justice.  Mr. Cohen has published several articles on securities, international and white-collar litigation issues and has been a presenter and chair at many professional conferences. He is also a frequent commentator in print and television media.  Mr. Cohen has been named a “Litigation Star” by Benchmark Litigation, a “Super Lawyer” in Criminal Litigation, and his work is noted by Legal 500 in the areas of white collar criminal defense and securities litigation, and in Chambers in the white collar area.

Mr. Cohen received his Bachelors degree from Middlebury College, his Masters degree in History from Duke University and his Juris Doctor from Duke University Law School, where he was a moot court champion. He is a member of the bars of New York and Massachusetts.

Recent speaking engagements:

• PLI FCPA 2011 Conference, New York, May 2011
• ACI FCPA-Health Sciences Conference, New York, May 2010
• “The New SEC Individual Cooperation Initiative,” Webinar Presentation, March 11, 2010
• ACI Annual FCPA Conference, Washington, D.C., November 2008
• Legal IQ Annual Securities Litigation Conference, New York, May 2008
• “Ethics and Experts,” 2007 Antitrust Law Section Symposium, New York State Bar Association

Recent Publications:

• “Private Equity Investment and the FCPA,” “Review of Securities and Commodities Regulations,” Fall 2011
• “UK Government and Serious Fraud Office Publish Guidance on the Bribery Act,” March 31, 2011
• “UK Serious Fraud Office Director Alderman Visits Again with Gibson Dunn, Discusses Bribery Act Enforcement and Lays Out Engagement Strategy,” January 11, 2011
• “Insider Trading: It’s Not for Suits,” Law Journal Newsletters, December 2010
• “Six Ways a Board Can Manage FCPA Risk,” Corporate Board Member Magazine, October 1, 2010
• “UK Serious Fraud Office Discusses Details of UK Bribery Act with Gibson Dunn,” September 7, 2010
• “Erosion of the Fiduciary Duty Requirement in Insider Trading Actions,” Securities Litigation Journal, American Bar Association, Spring 2010
• “Narrow, Don’t Abolish:  The Facilitating Payments Exception to the FCPA,” The New York Law Journal, July 8, 2010
• Webcast: The New SEC Individual Cooperation Initiative, March 11, 2010
• “Mutual Fund Litigation Triggered By the Credit Crisis,” The Review of Securities & Commodities Regulation,” June 3, 2009
• “Under the FCPA, Who is a Foreign Official Anyway?,”  The Business Lawyer, 2008
• “Due Diligence Under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act: Defining a Foreign Official,” Clifford Chance US Regulatory & White Collar Update, 2008
• “Anti-Money Laundering Laws and Regulations for Broker-Dealers: Spotlight on Foreign Broker-Dealers,” Clifford Chance Client Memo, 2008
• “The U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and its Application to Foreign Companies that Do Not Issues Securities in the U.S.,” Clifford Chance Client Memo, 2008
• “Five Things to Know About the FCPA,” Corporate Compliance Zeitschrift, January 2008
• “SEC on Corporate Penalties: Two Steps Forward, One Step Backward,” New York Law Journal, February 2006
• “Toward True Deterrence of Government Misconduct,” New York Law Journal, October 2004
• “Regulation FD,” New York Law Journal, October 2002

Recent Media:

• “Pro Bono Hot List,” National Law Journal, January 2, 2012
• “The Curious Case of Nelson Obus, “ The New York Times, Sunday Business Section Feature Article, June 5, 2011
• “Attorneys from Gibson Dunn Tally 9000 Hours in Day Laborer’s Cause,” National Law Journal, March 24, 2011
• “Danbury 11,” Editorial, The New York Times, March 14, 2011