November 2006 Archives

This paper assesses the federal government's regulation of white-collar criminal prosecution as articulated in the 2003 memorandum issued by then-Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson. In particular, the paper is critical of the memorandum's open inducement to corporations under investigation to waive attorney-client privilege and refuse to advance attorneys' fees to individual defendants. The paper proposes specific reforms to reduce the tendency of government prosecutions to infringe on important individual liberties.