Privilege: A Pocket Guide

 In Compliance, FCPA

Yet another Federal Judicial Center Pocket Guide for Judges, this time about handling privileged, classified or otherwise secret government information in litigation. This guide addresses both civil and criminal contexts. The Classified Information Procedures Act (CIPA) addressed the handling of state secrets in criminal matters and a similar approach is adopted in civil matters. This guide also addresses the role of Classified Information Security Officers (CISOs). I’m posting this not just because I’m a big fan of the Judge’s Pocket Guide series, but also because of the potential for privileged information of foreign states to be caught up in Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) searches. And for such information to be used subsequently in FCPA prosecutions against corporations that did business with the foreign state that was the subject of the FISA search. As of 2010, this is no longer a hypothetical problem. Read here about prison sentences handed down for FCPA violations based on evidence obtained under the auspices of a FISA search.

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