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Real deals
Thomas Lay Realtors reports the following sales:
• Rio79 LLC paid $2.5 million to DPC Investments LLC for 79 lots in Rio de Bella addition at SW 119 and Rockwell Avenue. Ron Gary with Thomas Lay Realtors handled the sale.
• ENARC Properties LLC paid $1.475 million to First Assembly of God Church of Yukon for 20 acres at W Reno Avenue and Sara Road. Steve Lay with Thomas Lay Realtors handled the sale.
• Robert and Mary Ablah paid $1.2 million to 92nd Investments LLC for a 4,260-square-foot shopping center at 9201 S Western Ave. Steve Lay handled the sale.
• Communication Federal Credit Union paid $1,148,218 to Fox Lake Investments LLC for 1.44 acres at Fox Lake Plaza, Lot 1, in Edmond. Gary represented the buyer and Stuart Graham with CB Richard Ellis-Oklahoma represented the seller.
• M.H. Dugan paid $975,000 to James Living Trust for 80 acres at 9512 W Britton Road. Steve Lay handled the sale.
• Domikon LLC paid $853,125 to John Robert Kouba for 1.34 acres at State Highway 92 and NW 10 in Yukon. Steve Lay handled the sale.
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Jewel Box Theatre's production of "The 39 Steps" is a charming and entertaining event, well worth an evening of your time. The script, a light and witty satire of classic Alfred Hitchcock film scenarios, needs sharp timing, precise and clear diction, and lots of stage and theater magic — the kind that usually requires a proscenium stage, with wings, flies and special lighting.
The Jewel Box, with its open, in-the-round construction, would not be considered an ideal setting for this show. However, director Jennifer Teel renders "The 39 Steps" beautifully. Her cast, most of whom are faced with the need to be many characters, has adapted to the needs of the piece and deliver solid and engaging performances.
As Richard Hannay, Kevin Logan is the only actor who has the luxury of not changing identities, and in return he has to carry the piece. He does this ably, bringing the audience along for an exciting ride through various scenes parodied from classic Hitchcock films.
Logan is well partnered by Crystal Ecker, who plays her several roles — femme fatale, trapped woman and ingenue — with equal deftness and grace. Richie Rayfield and Matt Barger handled the roles of the two clowns very well. The hat scene demonstrates the cleverness with which these two actors switch among several character parts with only a change of headgear and vocal styling.
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subset: commoncrawl


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No matter how challenging or complex your organization's leadership development needs, Corporate Education at the Naveen Jindal School of Management has the knowledge, experience and ability to customize solutions based on your organization's talent development goals and business performance objectives. Corporate Education's primary mission is to develop leaders who will be able to lead effectively now, and in the years to come.
Corporate education has a deep range of experience and a wide breadth of resources. Clients partner with Corporate Education because we are flexible, easy to work with and have a proven track record of equipping leaders so that they are able to maximize business performance. The collaborative partnerships we develop with clients are built with long-term sustainable success in mind.
Our Leadership Development Solutions often span multiple business disciplines and may combine instructor-led, coaching, team building, leadership assessments, action learning projects, and distance or blended learning into a seamlessly delivered program that builds a more successful business enterprise. For more information, please visit the Program Solution Continuum. Also, please view our article as seen in Time Magazine.
Corporations are focused now more than ever on developing leaders with the skills, knowledge and capabilities to meet their future organizational challenges. Whether they are growing organically through a merger or acquisition or in turnaround mode, The Corporate Education team at UT Dallas partners with corporations to equip leaders with the specific skills required to succeed.
We partner with corporations to understand their talent needs and develop learning solutions that incorporate leadership skill development and enhanced business acumen capabilities to accelerate leadership success to maximize business performance.
Clients partner with Corporate Education to understand their business goals and objectives in order to define and craft a leadership development strategy that ensures success. This collaborative relationship links client strategy and desired outcomes with the appropriate learning solutions to maximize business performance. Solutions often span functional areas of management and combine leadership skill development which may include classroom programs, coaching, team building, action learning projects, distance or blended learning, research and consulting services.
Almost 50 corporate professionals from nine countries have visited UT Dallas to participate in a leadership development program at the Naveen Jindal School of Management. This custom-designed program for Safran Corporate University is a collaboration between the Texas-based university and Safran, a $15 billion Paris-based aerospace, defense and security company.
Gustavo Castillo, Safran's program manager, says the UT Dallas program was "a great fit for us." The leadership development program for High Potential Mid-Level Leaders combines online learning with classroom sessions. "We were awarded a contract to design, develop, deliver and provide all program oversight for six programs," said John Fowler, director of Corporate Education. UT Dallas also was awarded a five-year contract to deliver a management development program targeting High Potential First-Line Leaders.
Preparatory online sessions included accounting, finance, strategy and practical applications of business theory. The classroom sessions cover leadership, cultural awareness, strategy, organizational development, finance, Lean Six Sigma and supply chain management, among other key topics. The program uses business cases, experiential exercises, textbooks and videos. Each group also participates in a corporate improvement project delivered to Safran's senior executives. The program is delivered by UT Dallas faculty in France, China and the United States. This program is representative of the depth and breadth of educational experiences that Corporate Education at the Naveen Jindal School of Management has to offer.
A group of 25 corporate professionals from Australia and the U.S. visited UT Dallas to participate in a leadership development program at the Naveen Jindal School of Management. The program was custom-designed for Infigen Energy, a developer, owner and operator of renewable energy-generation resources, with interests in Australia and the U.S. The program was delivered in partnership with UT Dallas Corporate Education, the Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM) and Infigen.
Craig Carson, CEO of Infigen USA, said, "UT Dallas has done a great job. The session of Continuous Improvement was great and dead on with our needs – exceeded my expectations."
The leadership development program brought senior leaders and high potential leaders together for a five-day classroom-based experience that combined modules on leadership, continuous improvement, coaching, and team-building activities delivered by UT Dallas and AGSM faculty, business coaches who are alums of UT Dallas's Organizational Development and Professional Coaching program and other experts.
The Corporate Education division of Executive Education was awarded the contract based on its ability to develop curriculum, and to lead and deliver the core modules. Corporate Education works in-depth with the clients to provide solutions to their specific leadership development needs through customized programs.
High Potential Mid-Level Leadership Development and business acumen-focused program. Nearly 150 'Group Managers' attended this program over three years.
|Pre Work
|Module 1 (Dallas, Texas – 10 day program)
|Pre Work
|Module 2 (Beijing & Shanghai China – 10 day program)
|Pre Work
|Module 3 (Paris, France – 10 day program)
|E-Learning Assignments
Building an Effective Presentation
Pre-reading assignments:
Complete a team member introduction
|Company Financial and Strategy Presentations by Client Executives
Marketing Workshop
Leadership Competencies and Behaviors
Client Company Leadership Model
Cross Cultural Management Skills
Personal Development Program
Company Visits/Cultural Events
|E-Learning Assignments
Work with team on group project
Pre-reading assignments:
|Integration & Organizational Development
Finance & Economics
Business Strategy
Personal Development Program
Company Visits/Cultural Events
|E-Learning Assignments
Work with team on group project
Pre-reading assignment:
|Group Project Presentations
Personal Development Program
Company Visits/Cultural Events
Leadership Development Program for 150 Mid-Level leaders (Directors) focused on developing knowledge and skills in leadership, business acumen, strategic planning, communications and generational diversity. The program will be offered to managers in the near future.
|Module 1 – two days Leadership Development
|Module 2 – two days Business Acumen
|Module 3 – two days Strategic Planning
|Module 4 – one day Communications
|Module 5 – one day Generational Diversity
Discover what motivates people to perform at their best
Contrast and compare Managing versus Leading
Learn how to create a culture of trust
Define the five attributes and key behaviors of effective leaders
Gain insights into your natural leadership style and learn how to maximize your leadership potential
Apply a coaching process that can be applied in numerous situations
Skill practice : coaching for performance improvement
Discuss how the company makes money – understand the company's total business
Learn the 5 Drivers of business: Cash, Profits, Assets, Growth, People
Demystify the annual report and financial statements
Identify the most important measures of financial performance
Measure the company's financial performance around the 5 drivers
Discuss important external factors that impact the company
Overview of Strategic Planning principles and process
Apply strategic tools and thinking to evaluate and expand on current group strategy
Evaluate alternative strategies through Scenario Planning
Embrace innovation balanced with financial stability
Present group strategy to panel of executive leaders
Apply the principles of situational communication to a business presentation
Apply content and message development strategies to improve effectiveness of communications
Handle questions and objections with ease
Use DiSC ™ to identify communication preferences of others and learn how to tailor your communications for the best outcome
Create a Story Catalog
Deliver a compelling presentation which is videotaped for personal development
Differentiate the five generations in the workplace
Discover why traditional approaches aren't effective generationally
Understand the points of friction between generations
Practice ways to create inclusion
Program Conclusion
Explore shared experiences through Dialogue Circle Method
Recognition and Celebration
|Post Work:
|Post Work:
|Post Work:
|Post Work:
|Post Work:
Leadership Skills for First Line Leaders. This program is followed by, "First Line Leaders II" six months from time of completion.
|Module 1 One Day FOUNDATIONS OF LEADERSHIP
|Module 2 One Day LEADING YOUR TEAM TO EXECUTE
|Module 3 One Day ACHIEVING YOUR LEADERSHIP POTENTIAL
|Welcome and Program Overview
What does it mean to be a Leader?
Values, Principles & Ethics
"Managing" vs. "Leading"
Becoming a Collaborative Leader
|Execution: Getting things done through others
|The Effective Leader
|4 week interlude with an online module: "Leadership, Influence and Communication in Business"
|4 week interlude with an online module: "The Structure and Culture of a Business Organization"
For 25 senior leaders and CEO's of geographical locations. Thought leadership across core functional areas including Leadership, Marketing, Strategy, Finance and Board Management for non-profits.
|Sunday Welcome
|Monday Leadership
|Tuesday Leadership
|Wednesday Marketing Strategy
|Thursday Strategic Planning
|Friday Financial Management & Forecasting
Welcome and Overview of the Week
Guest Speaker:
Dinner and prep work for Tuesday
Tour of UT Dallas
Dinner and prep work for Wednesday
Dinner & prep work for Thursday
Prep work for Friday
Reception and Awarding of Certificates
Closing Dinner
A program for 45 senior level leaders designed to expose them to US global business practices and to meet with US corporations to learn about their global operations. The week-long program consists of global business concepts and best practices every morning and corporate site visits every afternoon.
|Day 1 Cross Cultural Leadership
|Day 2 Global Strategy
|Day 3 Global Mergers & Acquisitions
|Day 4 Innovation & Innovation Management
|Day 5 Global Business Ethics
Dinner and local cultural events
Dinner and local event
Dinner and local event
Dinner event
Program Close
Leadership Development Program for client's Top 40 Leaders to develop and focus on emotional intelligence, authentic leadership, developing high performing teams and building team capability to accelerate innovation and achieve operational excellence.
|Day 1
|Day 2
|Day 3
|Day 4
|Day 5
Executive Team Workshop
Executive Team Workshop
Executive Team
Team Dinner
Middle Management
Middle Management
Leadership Development workshops designed for plant managers to improve the effectiveness of their current Continuous Improvement programs and to improve the performance of their teams with increased ability to resolve conflicts and influence others.
|Day 1 Continuous Improvement
|Day 2 Interpersonal Skills and Team Development
Leadership Development Program to develop Mid-Level leaders in terms of collaborative leadership, enhanced communication skills and strategy execution.
|Launch and Preparation
|Module I Two days LEADERSHIP
|Accountability Teams
|Module 2 Two days COMMUNICATION
|Accountability Teams
|Module 3 Two days STRATEGY
Leadership Development Program to develop First Line leaders in collaborative leadership, building team capability and communication skills.
|Launch and Preparation
|Module I Two days LEADERSHIP
|Accountability Teams
|Module 2 Two days TEAM CAPABILITY
|Accountability Teams
|Module 3 Two days COMMUNICATION
Designed to emulate the breadth of an MBA degree, the Certificate of Management program was created by UT Dallas to offer business education to prepare individuals to move into higher levels of leadership. Styled as a "Mini-MBA", this professional development program conveys the fundamental knowledge, key insights, important tools and the essential fundamentals of a traditional MBA degree program in a highly concentrated form. The 16 module program is offered as an open-enrollment, self-paced, 100% online program.
|Part 1 Managing in Today's World
|Part 2 The Functions and Structure of Management
|Part 3 The Workplace and It's Workers
|Part 4 Leading and Controlling
The following leadership development program continuum illustrates our range of expertise along a program partnership. We partner with our clients to design, develop and deliver learning solutions to equip leaders with the knowledge, skills and abilities to maximize their business performance.
UT Dallas Corporate Education as a Strategic Partner
Program Solution Continuum


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Legal Policy
No. 18 February 2014
The Shadow Lengthens:
The Continuing Threat of Regulation by Prosecution
James Copland and
Isaac Gorodetski
Executive Summary
The last ten years have seen the emergence of a new approach to business regulation and prosecution of wrongdoing in the United States. The U.S. Department of Justice now regularly enters into deferred prosecution or non-prosecution agreements (DPAs or NPAs) with large corporations, in which companies are paying billions of dollars in fines annually without trial. These agreements are presented as steps short of prosecution of corporations, a step that might drive firms into bankruptcy and disrupt their economic sectors. At the same time, a good case can be made that these agreements suffer from a lack of transparency. Questions naturally arise as to whether attorneys working for the federal government, with minimal to no judicial oversight, are best positioned to change significantly the business practices of individual companies and, indeed, entire industries.
Businesses prefer to enter into DPAs or NPAs rather than face trial, even when the costs of such arrangements are severe, because of the significant capital-market pressures stemming from criminal inquiries (including depressed stock prices and impaired credit) as well as the statutory and regulatory consequences flowing from indictment or convictionfor example, exclusion from government reimbursement or contracts, or the retraction of government licenses vital to a companys operation. Prosecutors, in turn, prefer to avoid the risk and cost of trial as well as the potentially severe collateral consequences that indictment or conviction can impose on corporate stakeholders, including employees and creditors, as witnessed in the collapse of the large accounting firm Arthur Andersen following its 2002 federal indictmentwhich was ultimately set aside by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Thus, such arrangements have become commonplace, so much so that they might be characterized as a shadow regulatory state over business. The federal government has reached 278 DPAs and NPAs with businesses since 2004, with ten of the Fortune 100 companies operating under such agreements just since 2010. Although the federal government entered into only 17 DPAs and NPAs from 1993 through 2003, it entered into 66 in just the last two years, in which almost $12 billion in total fines and penalties were imposed. Companies in the finance and health-care sectors have been particularly likely to wind up under such agreements, with the finance sector accounting for 13 DPAs and NPAs and the health-care sector accounting for 8 of them in 201213. The reach of federal prosecutorial agreements has not stopped at Americas shores: the Department of Justice has asserted authority over hosts of foreign businessesin some cases, for alleged conduct occurring completely outside the United States.
DPAs and NPAs are notable in that they impose terms on companies that go beyond the fines or incarceration normally associated with criminal punishment and because they go beyond requiring that the companies correct the specific practices alleged to be violations of the law. Instead, these agreements often call for major changes in firms internal processes of many typesfrom training to human resourcesbased on the apparent assumption that absent such changes, wrongdoing will be more likely to recur. Under DPAs and NPAs, companies have agreed to modify preexisting business practices significantly, by:
In many cases, the alleged predicate offenses underlying DPAs or NPAs involve ambiguous facts or strained or novel interpretations of lawinterpretations that have remained untested in court, given companies pronounced pressure to settle. In addition, DPAs and NPAs regularly cede to prosecutors the sole discretion to determine whether companies are in breach of the agreements terms, without judicial oversight or the possibility of appeal.
This report focuses on DPAs and NPAs reached in 2012 and 2013 between prosecutors and four companies: Ralph Lauren, GlaxoSmithKline, Royal Bank of Scotland, and HSBC. These arrangements highlight companies difficulty in avoiding potential prosecution, even when they self-report potential violations discovered through robust internal compliance programs. They also highlight the broad social consequences of federal prosecutors quasi-regulatory decisions, which include:
The U.S. practice of entering into DPAs and NPAs with corporations remains anomalous: corporate prosecutions are disfavored or impermissible in other developed nations. In 2013, however, the United Kingdom passed new legislationthe Crime and Courts Act, which introduced DPAs to the British criminal justice system beginning in February 2014. In contrast to U.S. practice, the U.K. rules limit the scope of corporate conduct subject to such arrangements and clearly delineate a transparent process that prosecutors must follow in pursuing DPAs, with significant judicial oversight. The new British rules bear watching as they are implemented, and they offer a potential blueprint for reforming American practice.
James Copland is the director of and a senior fellow with the Manhattan Institutes Center for Legal Policy, which seeks to develop and communicate novel, sound ideas on how to improve the civil and the criminal justice systems. He oversees the Institutes PointofLaw.com web magazine, its Trial Lawyers, Inc. series of publications, and its ProxyMonitor.org corporate governance database.
Copland has testified before U.S. Congress and has authored many policy white papers, book chapters, and articles in journals, including the Harvard Business Law Review and the Yale Journal on Regulation, as well as opinion pieces in newspapers, including the Wall Street Journal, National Law Journal, and USA Today. Speaking regularly on civil and criminal justice issues, he has made hundreds of media appearances in outlets including PBS, Fox News, MSNBC, CNBC, Fox Business, Bloomberg, C-SPAN, and NPR; and he is frequently cited in news articles in periodicals such as the New York Times, the Washington Post, The Economist, and Forbes.
In both 2011 and 2012, Copland was named to the National Association of Corporate Directors Directorship 100 list, which designates the individuals most influential over U.S. corporate governance.
Prior to joining the Manhattan Institute, Copland was a management consultant with McKinsey and Company in New York. Earlier, he served as a law clerk for Ralph K. Winter on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He has been a director of two privately held manufacturing companies since 1997 and has served on many public and nonprofit boards, including those for the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church, and the Union Church of Pocantico Hills (NY).
Copland received JD and MBA degrees from Yale, where he was an Olin Fellow in Law and Economics and an editor of the Yale Journal on Regulation. He also earned an MSc in politics of the world economy from the London School of Economics and a BA in economics with highest distinction and highest honors from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he was a Morehead Scholar.
Isaac Gorodetski is the deputy director of the Center for Legal Policy at the Manhattan Institute, the managing editor of PointofLaw.com, and the project manager for the Trial Lawyers, Inc. series of publications. Gorodetski also heads the Centers state-specific overcriminalization initiative, which seeks to bring the alarming trend of over-expansive criminal codes and regulations to the fore of the public policy debate, and he co-leads the Institutes NYC21 initiative, which explores the impact of city governments public policies on Gothams economically most vulnerable communities.
Gorodetski received a JD in 2011 from New York Law School, where he was president of the schools Federalist Society chapter, and a BBA in Economics from Baruch College.
On January 6, 2014, the nations largest bank, JPMorgan Chase, entered into a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) with federal prosecutors relating to its having served as a cash depository for Bernie Madoffs former Ponzi investment scheme.[1] As part of this arrangement, the bank agreed to pay the government $1.7 billion and to cooperate with prosecutors for a period of three years. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) agreed, in turn, not to prosecute the company.[2] The New York Times reported that such DPAs are typically employed only when misconduct is extreme, such that the arrangement underscores the magnitude of the case against JPMorgan.[3]
Contrary to the Timess assertion, however, DPAs, non-prosecution agreements (NPAs), and other arrangements in which companies avoid criminal sanctions by agreeing with federal prosecutors demands, without trial, are increasingly commonparticularly among financial institutions. Indeed, JPMorgan itself entered into such an agreement in 2011 (involving antitrust allegations and a fine of $228 million),[4] as did Wachovia, now a part of Wells Fargo, in 2010 (involving alleged money laundering and a fine of $160 million).[5] Other financial behemoths entering into federal DPAs and NPAs just since 2009 include insurers General Re[6], Lloyds[7], and MetLife[8]; mortgage giants Fannie Mae[9] and Freddie Mac;[10] and foreign banks ABN Amro,[11] Barclays,[12] Credit Suisse,[13] Deutsche Bank,[14] Royal Bank of Scotland,[15] and UBS.[16]
DPAs and NPAs were unknown before 1993 and virtually unheard of prior to 2004; but over the last decade, the DOJ and other federal agencies have entered into at least 278 such agreements with companies.[17] Corporate fines and forfeitures under these arrangements have totaled $25 billion over the last five years.[18] Since the beginning of 2010, federal DPAs and NPAs have been reached with ten of the 100 largest U.S. companies by revenues, as ranked by Fortune magazine: Archer Daniels Midland, CVS Caremark, Google, Johnson & Johnson, Merck, MetLife, Pfizer, Tyson Foods, and United Parcel Service, in addition to JPMorgan Chase.[19] Over the same period, federal prosecutors have also entered into such arrangements with a plethora of global businesses headquartered outside the United States, including ABB, Alcatel-Lucent, Barclays Bank, Daimler, GlaxoSmithKline, Lufthansa, Royal Bank of Scotland, Total S.A., and Tyco.[20]
Whereas criminal sanctions are normally limited to fines and incarceration, DPAs and NPAs can entail significant changes to companies business practices, on top of the hefty fines and penalties that companies surrender. Corporate behavioral changes are not limited to correcting the behavior alleged to be criminal; rather, they can entail wide-ranging modifications of business practices presumably intended to prevent a recurrence of the alleged violation. In addition, companies entering into these agreements regularly consent to significant prosecutorial oversight of the terms of the agreement. Such changes to business practice and consent to oversight can be significant, including:
DPAs and NPAs typically state that the prosecutor has sole discretion to determine whether the company has complied with the agreements terms, with no possibility for judicial review.
This report focuses on DPAs and NPAs entered into in 2012 and 2013. Part I looks at DPA and NPA trends quantitatively, including the number of such agreements, the level of fines imposed, the alleged crimes committed, and other trends. Part II looks qualitatively at DPAs and NPAs entered into in the last two years between the government and four companiesRalph Lauren, Royal Bank of Scotland, GlaxoSmithKline, and HSBCand elucidates policy issues highlighted by these examples. Part III offers an international, comparative perspective by looking at recent reforms establishing DPA practice in the United Kingdom. Part IV concludes and looks to the transparency and oversight framework in the new U.K. law as a template for potential reform of American practice.
Previous Manhattan Institute Research on the Subject
Coauthor James Copland began his study of federal DPAs and NPAs in a 2010 report, Regulation by Prosecution: The Problems with Treating
Corporations as Criminals,[21] which explored the broader question of corporate criminal liability in historical and
international perspective. That report found that the American practice of holding corporations criminally liable for employees actions was
relatively novel and an outlier among Western nations.[22]
In a 2012 report, The Shadow Regulatory State: The Rise of Deferred Prosecution Agreements,[23] Copland explored
how the federal government began entering into such agreements, beginning in 1993, and how the number of DPAs and NPAs exploded after 2004.
In 2012-13, the Manhattan Institutes Center for Legal Policy published two shorter reports expanding on aspects of this phenomenon: one by Copland
and Paul Howard (director of the Institutes Center for Medical Progress), on federal criminal enforcement applied against pharmaceutical companies
marketing and communications about drug uses outside those that appear on labels approved by the federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA);
[24] and one by criminal defense attorney Paul Enzinna on trends in federal enforcement under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act
(FCPA),[25] a statute underlying a significant percentage of DPAs and NPAs.[26]
I. Quantitative Analysis: Federal DPA and NPA Trends, 201213
DPA and NPA Trends: Volume
Since 2005, federal prosecutors have entered into 20 or more [DPAs or NPAs] annually.[28] In 2012, the DOJ, its U.S. Attorneys Offices, and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) entered into 38 such agreements, the third-highest number on record. The total number of DPAs and NPAs dipped to 28 in 2013 (see chart).
DPA and NPA Trends: Fines and Penalties
Since 2009, the dollar value of DPAs and NPAs has soared.[29] From 2009 through 2011, over $3 billion was collected each year. In 2012, a record $9 billion in fines was imposed, led by $3 billion levied against GlaxoSmithKline and $1.9 billion against HSBC. Just under $3 billion in fines and penalties were levied under federal DPAs and NPAs in 2013 (see chart). With JPMorgans $1.7 billion agreement already announced in 2014, the trend of high levels of fines under federal DPAs and NPAs seems certain to continue.
DPA and NPA Trends: Crimes Alleged
DPAs and NPAs involving alleged violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA; see box, page 6) are a significant percentage of all such agreements entered into between companies and the federal government, although the percentage of DPAs and NPAs involving the FCPA has fallen from 38 percent in 201011 to 25 percent in 201213. General fraud allegationsexcluding health-care-specific frauds, false statements, public corruption, and violations of the False Claims Act[30] rose to 28 percent of all cases over the last two years, up from 20 percent in the earlier period. Export- and trade-related allegations increased to 14 percent of all DPA and NPA agreements in 201213, and agreements involving alleged immigration offenses and alleged violations of the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act[31] each constituted 6 percent of all DPAs and NPAs in the past two years (see chart).
DPA and NPA Trends: Prosecuting Divisions Involved
DPAs and NPAs have most often originated in the Fraud Section of the Criminal Division of the DOJ,[32] including in 11 of 38 federal DPAs and NPAs in 2012 and 11 of 28 in 2013. Whereas the Fraud Section was acting alone in nine of its 11 agreements in 2012, it partnered with another section or a local U.S. Attorneys Office in nine of the 11 agreements that it reached in 2013signaling perhaps a shift in practice. U.S. Attorneys Offices active in entering into DPAs and NPAs over the last two years have included the Southern District of New York (six agreements), the Eastern District of New York (four), the Eastern District of Virginia (four), and the Southern District of Texas (four).[33]
In January 2010, the SEC announced that it would begin to use DPAs and NPAs in enforcementa departure from its historical practice of limiting itself to civil remedies, given the agencys lack of independent criminal enforcement authority. The SEC entered into agreements in each of the last two years, including, most recently, an NPA with Ralph Lauren involving alleged FCPA offenses. Also, for the first time, in February 2013, the Antitrust Division entered into a DPA, reaching an agreement with the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) over alleged manipulation of the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR). The Ralph Lauren and RBS agreements are discussed in more detail in Part II.
DPA and NPA Trends: Companies Involved
Federal DPAs and NPAs have been most prevalent in the finance and health-care sectors.[34] In 200911, a total of 18 agreements involved companies in the financial sector and 11 involved health-care-sector businesses. This trend has generally continued in 201213, during which 13 DPAs and NPAs have involved finance companies and 8 have involved health-care companies.
DPA and NPA Trends: Agreement Structure
In 201213, 45 percent of federal agreements not to prosecute companies have been NPAs, and the remaining 55 percent DPAsthe identical percentages as in 201011. A decrease in prevalence in which corporate monitors were appointed in 2011 (from nine of 40 in 2010 to two of 34 in 2011) suggested that the DOJ may have been de-emphasizing such appointments,[35] but the 2011 shift proved anomalous: the government appointed a monitor in nine of 38 agreements in 2012 and nine of 28 in 2013.
II. Qualitative Analysis: Key Federal DPAs and NPAs in 201213
In this part of the report, we will focus on four DPAs and NPAs reached between the federal government and companies in 201213. These agreements highlight the degree to which such arrangements can substantially modify corporate decision making, and they suggest other issues of policy concern, including: (1) the difficulties that companies face in avoiding prospective prosecution, even when they self-report potential violations discovered through robust internal compliance programs; (2) the degree to which the DOJ can stretch or even flout legal parameters in unilaterally interpreting and enforcing the law; (3) the significant social consequences that can flow from such agreements; (4) the global sweep of the DOJs DPA/NPA enforcement regime; and (5) the striking lack of judicial oversight typically present in this practice.
Our first example is a pair of 2013 agreements reached between the government and Ralph Lauren. This example highlights the SECs emerging role as a co-enforcer with the DOJ of alleged FCPA violations. In addition, the Ralph Lauren NPAs demonstrate the difficulties faced even by those companies that develop aggressive compliance regimes and self-report possible violations. The Ralph Lauren example also highlights the broad scope of federal FCPA enforcement, in which the executive branch is arguably holding companies to account for activities exempted from Congresss statute, with minimal prospects for judicial review.
Our second example is the 2012 corporate integrity agreement reached between the government and the American subsidiary of GlaxoSmithKline as an NPA-type side deal to the companys guilty plea for promoting off-label uses for the companys drugs. Another example of cross-agency co-enforcement (involving both the U.S. Attorneys Office for the District of Massachusetts and the Department of Health and Human Services), the agreement makes significant adjustments to the companys compensation packages, including for senior executives.
Our third example, a 2013 agreement between the government and the Royal Bank of Scotland resolving claims that the bank manipulated its rate submissions that helped determine the London Bank Offered Rate (LIBOR), is the first instance in which the DOJs Antitrust Division co-enforced a DPA with the Criminal Division. The agreement also demonstrates the international reach of current criminal enforcement and the broad scope of remedies that the DOJ is prepared to embrace.
Our fourth example involves the 2012 DPA reached between the British bank HSBC and the DOJs Criminal Division and two U.S. Attorneys Offices. This DPA resolved allegations that the bank had insufficient controls to prevent money laundering and exemplifies the lengths to which financial institutions will go to avoid criminal indictment: the bank removed most of its senior management team, radically restructured managers compensation, jettisoned businesses around the globe for fear of inability to comply with legal rules, and agreed to a five-year term of supervision by a corporate monitor reporting to prosecutors. This example also offers a rare case in which a supervising judge exercised oversight: Judge John Gleeson of the Eastern District of New York issued a detailed opinion asserting judicial oversight for the HSBC DPA, even as he approved its onerous termsin essence, establishing a role for the judiciary in cases in which the government has decided to defer potential corporate prosecutions.
Expanding Enforcement: The Ralph Lauren Company NPAs
Operative Statute: Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA)
Key Issues: Crediting of corporate compliance, scope of enforcement outside statutory safe harbor
As already noted, the FCPA[36] is a major locus of federal criminal law enforcement. On April 22, 2013, the Fraud Section of the Criminal Division of the DOJ and the SEC entered into separate NPAs[37] with Ralph Lauren Company (RLC)a well-known publicly traded apparel companyto resolve allegations that it had violated the FCPA.
What Is the FCPA?
The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act creates civil and criminal penalties for businesses and individuals who pay bribes to foreign officials.
[38] Enacted in 1977, the FCPA is intended to prevent American-based businesses from gaining a competitive advantage abroad by
buying regulations and government contracts. Implicitly, the statute is rooted in American idealism and in the belief that American interests are
fostered, in the long run, by the rule of law abroad.
Although the FCPAs core purposes are noble, its scope, as enacted by Congress, was not without bounds. The statute specifically exempts
facilitating payments designed to expedite or secure the performance of a routine governmental action by a foreign official.
[39] Congresss intent in enacting the FCPA was clearly to deter American companies from buying foreign influence on a large
scalebut not to police all foreign bribes potentially paid by U.S. businesses. Given the powerful incentives that businesses have to enter into
DPAs and NPAs, however, federal prosecutors have very broadly interpreted the FCPAs scopeand limited its express exemptioneffectively insulating
it from judicial review.[40]
After implementing a new internal FCPA compliance policy in early 2010, RLC discovered that the general manager of its subsidiary PRL S.R.L., based in Argentina, had been paying a third-party customs-clearance agency to bribe Argentine customs and other government officials to bypass mandatory paperwork requirements and inspections for imported RLC merchandise that it sold in Argentina.[41] Additionally, PRL S.R.L. had disguised these paymentsapproximately $580,000 between 2005 and 2009with fake invoices marked as routine customs expenses and taxes.[42] Within two weeks of discovery, RLC reported the conduct to the DOJ and the SEC. The company fully cooperated with the government in the ensuing investigation while instituting a host of remedial compliance and governance changes, under its own initiative.[43]
The DOJ and the SEC entered into NPAs with RLC to avoid prosecution and enforcement actions, respectively. Despite recognizing and crediting RLCs self-reporting and extensive cooperation, the government claimed that the company had failed to devise and maintain a system of internal controls sufficient to provide reasonable assurances for its Argentine subsidiary.[44]
Under the SECs agreement,[45] RLC has to disgorge $593,000 in illicit profits and $141,845.79 in prejudgment interest.[46] The pecuniary penalty was the entirety of the NPAs real punitive terms, and RLC was even allowed to enter into the agreement without admitting or denying liability[47]a critical feature, though in this case, the DOJs NPA wiped out the SEC agreements benefit. The SEC attributed its leniency to the companys prompt reporting of the violations on its own initiative, the completeness of the information provided and its extensive, thorough, and real-time cooperation with SECs investigation.[48] The SEC also recognized the companys numerous remedial measures employed to mitigate the risk of future violations, such as terminating all culpable employees and the customs broker, instituting compliance training, strengthening internal controls and third-party due diligence, and comprehensively enhancing its compliance program.[49] In return for the recognition, RLC also agreed to continue its cooperation with the SEC, to comply with any requests for non-privileged information, and to refrain from making public statements relating to the agreement.[50]
Although the DOJs NPA with RLC copiously praised the company for its remedial efforts and self-reporting, the DOJ was not as magnanimous as the SEC. RLC not only had to pay an additional $882,000 penalty but also had to publicly admit wrongdoing[51]potentially opening the company up to shareholder derivative lawsuits.[52]
The most significant supplemental features of the DOJ agreement, as is characteristic of virtually all of DOJs alternative agreements, are the comprehensive governance requirements imposed on the company for a term of two years.[53] Rather than allowing RLC flexibility in maintaining its newly implemented compliance policies that had effectively detected the FCPA violation,[54] the DOJ inserted itself in shaping RLCs corporate governance. In the corporate compliance sectionwhich is nearly the length of the SECs entire agreementthe DOJ directs the frequency at which the company must review its compliance policies, sets the management structure for compliance oversight, requires setting up a separate reporting system dedicated to anticorruption issues, and instructs strict due diligence in the risk assessment of potential new acquisitions.[55]
Adding to the confusion is the special attention that the DOJs NPA pays to dictating the terms of compliance training, after acknowledging earlier in the agreement the extensive FCPA training that RLC had already implemented for its employees worldwide.[56] The DOJs NPA requires at least three comprehensive reports to be prepared by RLC on the status of its FCPA compliance program,[57] despite evidence throughout the agreement that DOJ has already received a detailed accounting of RLCs new policies and an open line of communication with the company.[58]
Issue 1. Enforcement Versus Compliance
The DOJs and the SECs decision to enter into NPAs with Ralph Lauren illustrates a core tension in corporate criminal enforcement: between
federal prosecutors desire to hold companies to account; and the desire to have companies self-monitor their own behavior and comply with legal
norms. In a 2009 report, The Conference Board openly worried that federal prosecutors practices were potentially undermining deterrence of
lawbreaking by inadequately crediting companies preexisting compliance programs: From an ethics and compliance incentives perspective, publicly
recognizing settlement-based programs (but not preexisting ones) in enforcement decisions is hardly optimal. In essence, it sends a message that the
companies need not be concerned with compliance/ethics programs until after a violation, and thereby undercuts the important law enforcement policy of
deterrence.[59] In RLCs case, the company detected the customs-bribery scheme only after implementing its own aggressive
compliance regime, and after it rooted out the potential FCPA violations, it quickly self-reported the issue to the government and implemented
rigorous remediation policies. Although RLCs extensive cooperation was a theme of both the DOJ and the SEC NPAs, the agreements do not detail how
the company was credited for its extraordinary efforts.
Moreover, the decisions by the SEC and the DOJ to enter into NPAs with RLC would seem to conflict with the governments 2012 FCPA resource guide,
[60] which purported to clarify FCPA enforcement to corporations.[61] In the FCPA guide, the DOJ and the
SEC outline declinationsdecisions not to prosecute, with no public allegations of wrongdoing or imposition of finesas a preferable alternative to
entering into a DPA or an NPA under various conditions.[62] The guide spells out six examples of declinations, and in comparing
those examples with RLCs self-reporting and remediation efforts, it becomes evident that RLC would seem to be a prototypical candidate for a
declination rather than an NPA.[63] Because the DOJ and the SEC failed to articulate reasons why they entered into NPAs with
RLC rather than opting for declination, as specified in the recently promulgated guidelines, companies face added uncertainty, which couldas The
Conference Board feareddeter some businesses from implementing new compliance programs or reporting the findings of internal investigations to the
Issue 2. Stretching the Law
Even though the FCPAs anti-bribery provisions prohibit the offer, promise, or payment of anything of value to a foreign official in order to
obtain or retain business,[64] the statute also contains an express exemption for facilitating payments designed to expedite
or secure the performance of a routine governmental action by a foreign official[65] (see box, page 6). The payment scheme in
which RLC was implicated in its NPAswhile hardly laudatorywas precisely designed to expedite routine government actions (customs) and not to secure
government contracts through quid pro quo payments, the paradigmatic type of corruption that the FCPA was designed to prevent. Given that the FCPA,
by its own terms, seems to establish a line between these two types of practiceimplicitly acknowledging that [c]orrupt low-level bureaucrats are
a fact of commercial life in many countries, and most businesses operating internationally have been solicited for payments to obtain permits,
licenses, customs clearances, and the like[66] the conduct that RLC self-reported looks to be precisely the type of activity
that Congress decided not to entrust to U.S. prosecutors.
Indeed, the Fifth Circuit, in its 2004 decision United States v. Kay,[67] made clear that not all such payments that
may secure a competitive advantage are deemed within the FCPAs scope. The Fifth Circuit suggested that an inquiry should be made by courts focusing
on the specific facts to determine whether a particular payment was, in fact, to obtain or retain business.[68] But RLClike
most other companies under these circumstanceschose to reach an agreement with the government rather than test the application of its interpretation
of the statute, such that the SEC and the DOJ were effectively holding the company to account for conduct at least arguably outside the bounds of the
Breaking New Ground: The GlaxoSmithKline Side Letter NPA
Operative Statute: Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA)
Key Issues: Public health consequences of criminal sanctions for truthful speech concerning off-label drug prescriptions
On July 2, 2012, GlaxoSmithKline LLC (GSK), a U.S.-based subsidiary of the British multinational pharmaceutical and health-care company GlaxoSmithKline PLC, reached an agreement with the U.S. Attorneys Office for the District of Massachusetts to plead guilty to resolve criminal allegations of drug misbranding and failure to report safety data in violation of the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.[70] The aggregate resolution was unprecedented in size and scope, according to Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole, as the largest health care fraud settlement in U.S. history and the largest payment ever by a drug company.[71] GSK LLC agreed to plead guilty to unlawfully promoting the drugs Paxil and Wellbutrin for off-label uses by sponsoring various programsincluding Continuing Medical Education lectures, lunches, dinners, and spasto promote the use of its drug Paxil in children and adolescents and the use of its drug Wellbutrin for weight loss and the treatment of sexual dysfunction, each indication being outside the narrow subset previously approved by the FDA.[72] GSK LLC also agreed to plead guilty to one count of failing to include necessary safety data in reports to the FDA about its Avandia drug.[73] In addition to $1 billion under the plea agreement, GSK LLC agreed to pay $2 billion in civil penalties to the federal government and the states.
What Are Off-Label Drug Prescriptions?
The FDCA requires drug companies, when seeking FDA approval for new pharmaceuticals, to specify every intended use for that drug; the agency
restricts companies from promoting uses for approved pharmaceuticals, after FDA approval, exclusively to those previously approved by the agency.
[74] Nevertheless, pharmaceuticals are commonly prescribed by doctors for uses beyond those listed on the label: such
off-label uses constitute an estimated 21 percent of all prescriptions, 36 percent of all drugs used in intensive-care units, and 79 percent of
drugs administered to children in pediatric hospitals.[75] Although these prescriptions are vital to the public health and
are supported by publications in peer-reviewed medical journals, they remain off-label because they generally do not offer sufficient economic
payback to warrant full review under the FDAs 50-year-old system for testing and approving new medicinesa system that requires large, cumbersome,
and expensive randomized clinical trials, typically controlled with a placebo or standard of care.[76] Under FDA rules,
drug companies promotion of off-label uses for its otherwise FDA-approved pharmaceuticals are considered misbranding of drugs misbranded in
violation of the FDCA.[77]
In addition to the $3 billion plea deal, GSK LLC and the Office of the Inspector General of the Department of Health and Human Services entered into a five-year corporate integrity agreement (CIA), which included stringent provisions requiring GSK LLC to make major changes to the way it does business.[78] The GSK CIA includes requirements that the company modify existingor develop newreporting systems, employee training programs, management and supervision structures, and other corporate governance mechanismsfeatures standard in most DPAs and NPAs that necessitate a great deal of resources and time to implement, monitor, and enforce.[79]
In addition, the GSK CIA included significant modifications to the companys compensation structures.[80] Such provisions are typical in DPAs and NPAs involving alleged drug misbranding: prosecutors intend to improve corporate compliance by realigning the compensation structure of the companys sales representatives away from volume goals to other factors such as business acumen, customer engagement, and scientific knowledge about GSKs products.[81] In advance of reaching its agreement with the government, GSK had already implemented new pay practices, including a so-called Patient First program and the wind-down of its program paying doctors to speak about the companys drugs: such payments by the company fell 80 percent between 2009 and 2012,[82] and GSK ultimately became the first major pharmaceutical company to cut off such payments altogether.[83] Notwithstanding these changes, the GSK CIA mandated major changes to senior executives compensation through a financial recoupment program.[84] Under this program, the agreement requires that an amount equivalent to up to 3 years of annual performance pay[85] (cash bonuses, stock options, and other incentives)[86] for covered executivesincluding executives from the parent company GSK PLCis all at risk of forfeiture and recoupment should the prosecutors later determine that an individual executive engaged in or should have known about an employees significant misconduct.[87] Under this program, GSK may even recoup bonuses from former employees.[88]
Issue 3. Social Costs of the Enforcement Regime
The FDA permits companies to share scientific information about off-label drug applications but not promotional information,
[89] an unclear distinction that has created for pharmaceutical companies a minefield without a map.[90]
As such, claims for illicit off-label drug promotion have been among the most commonly asserted Medicaid-fraud allegations in federal enforcement
actions.[91] The government is thus wielding the criminal-law threat as a major regulatory weapon without apparent
consideration of the public health, which is likely to be facilitated by the truthful dissemination of information about peer-reviewed applications
of pharmaceuticals requiring prescriptions by learned intermediaries. As in the RLC case, the government is pursuing its prosecutorial path
without clear legal guidance in the underlying law: companies facing exclusion from Medicare and Medicaid have been unwilling to put the
governments legal interpretations to the test; and individual prosecutions have been rare, typically resolved against the governments position.
In addition to GSKs agreement, the federal government has entered into multiple other multibillion-dollar settlements with other drug
manufacturers to resolve drug-misbranding allegations, including Pfizer ($2.3 billion), Eli Lilly ($1.4 billion), and Abbott Laboratories ($1.5
billion).[92] What each of those other settlements has in commonother than the alleged criminal conduct and astronomical
settlement valuesis that no individuals were prosecuted in connection to any of those cases.[93] In GSKs case, the DOJ accused
its general counsel Lauren Stevens of obstruction of justice and making false statements for withholding documents when the FDA was investigating the
charges levied under this agreement,[94] but a federal judge dismissed the case with withering criticism of the governments
actions in both the investigation and prosecution.[95]
The widespread nature of corporate drug-misbranding agreements and the absence of any individual criminal indictments for the underlying conduct
have largely insulated the government from testing its criminal-law theories in this area. In a major December 2012 decision, the U.S. Court of
Appeals for the Second Circuit overturned the federal prosecution of a pharmaceutical sales representative who had communicated truthful information
about an off-label drug use, ruling that criminalizing the truthful off-label promotion of FDA-approved prescription drugs was an unconstitutional
limitation on free speech in violation of the First Amendment.[96]
But no pharmaceutical company is likely to test such theories, given that an adverse judgment could exclude its products from reimbursement under
Medicare or Medicaideffectively, a corporate death sentence.[97] GSKs side letter NPA waiving the federal governments
authority to debar the company from federal reimbursement is common in such agreements[98]and indicative of the sword of
Damocles hanging over companies facing potential drug-misbranding prosecution,[99] which all but forces them to accept the
governments proposed terms.
Antitrust Enforcement Shift: The Royal Bank of Scotland DPA
Operative Statute: Sherman Antitrust Act, Wire Fraud Statute
Key Issues: International reach of U.S. Justice, economic policy impact of DOJ oversight
On February 6, 2013, the DOJs Antitrust Division partnered with the Criminal Divisions Fraud Section to enter into its first DPA: an agreement with the Royal Bank of Scotland,[100] a financial-services corporation headquartered in Edinburgh, as part of the DOJs enforcement efforts related to alleged manipulation of the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR).[101] RBS was charged with wire fraud for manipulating LIBOR rates and price fixing in violation of the Sherman Act[102] for colluding to manipulate those rates with other financial institutions.[103] (The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 prohibits any conspiracy
in restraint of trade or commerce, including price fixing.)[104]
What Is LIBOR?
The London Interbank Office Rate, or LIBOR, is an average interest rate based on estimates submitted by selected banks of what they would be charged when borrowing from other banks spanning ten currencies and 15 borrowing periods.[105] The LIBOR is published by British Bankers Association, a London-based trade association, every business day, based on rates contributed by selected contributor panels of banks, depending on currency.[106] The LIBOR serves as the benchmark interest rate for financial markets globally with futures, options, and other financial instruments settled based on the rate; and as a reference rate for consumer lending products such as mortgages, credit cards, and student loans.[107]
As a member of the contributor panels for various currencies, including the Japanese Yen LIBOR and the Swiss Franc LIBOR, RBS traders, from 2006 through 2010, allegedly manipulated RBSs submissions to push rates in those two currencies in a direction favorable to the banks internal trading positions.[108] Pursuant to the DPA, RBSs Tokyo-based subsidiary, RBS Securities Japan Limited, pleaded guilty to wire fraud for manipulating the LIBOR for the Japanese Yen and entered into a plea agreement that imposed a $50 million criminal penalty.[109] RBS also agreed to pay an additional $100 million in criminal fines[110] along with civil penalties levied by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the U.K. Financial Services Authority, amounting to $325 million and $137 million, respectively.[111]
The statement of facts in the RBS DPAan agreement spanning over 100 pagescontains detailed transcripts of RBS traders contacting the individuals at the bank charged with submitting LIBOR rates, in an effort to request favorable rates based on their trading positions. The DPA also alleges that RBS employees entered into agreements with traders from other banks to move rates.[112] The DOJ alleged that these practices amounted to a collusive scheme in violation of the antitrust laws and that the traders understood the features of the derivatives products tied to those benchmark interest rates, they understood that to the extent they increased their profits or decreased their losses in certain transactions from their efforts to manipulate rates, their counterparties would suffer corresponding adverse financial consequences with respect to those particular transactions.[113]
The DOJs two-year DPA features a wide array of requirements imposed on the company regarding compliance policies, reporting, and cooperation. The agreement mandates that within 60 days, the company must strengthen its compliance and internal control standards by developing new policies and procedures.[114] Setting out an extensive list of factors to be used in determining the submission of LIBOR rates, along with mandatory supervisory review, the DOJs required compliance requirements are supposedly geared to guarantee the integrity of the rates submitted by RBS.[115]
In addition, RBS is subject to rigorous record-keeping and documentation requirements, including the obligation to record and preserve audio records of the communications of rate submitters, supervisors, and derivatives traders.[116] RBS must arrange for internal and external audits, conduct employee training, and comply with demanding reporting requirements that extend beyond the two-year term of the DPA.[117] The DOJ, as its usual modus operandi, retains sole discretion to determine whether there has been a breach of the agreementwhich could even be triggered by the unilateral conduct or statement of an RBS employee.[118] Purportedly to prevent the risk of such a breach, RBSs DPA requires that any pertinent public statements or press releases by the bank be approved by the DOJ in advance.[119]
Establishing Judicial Review: The HSBC DPA
Operative Statute: Bank Secrecy Act
Key Issues: International/economic development implications of Justice efforts, judicial review
On December 11, 2012, with its U.S. banking license at stake, the London-based HSBC, through its subsidiary HSBC Bank USA and holding company HSBC Holdings, PLC, entered into a DPA with the DOJ Criminal Divisions Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Section, the U.S. Attorneys Office for the Eastern District of New York, and the U.S. Attorneys Office for the Northern District of West Virginia, for a five-year term.[120] The DPA (and simultaneously filed criminal charges) alleged that HSBC violated the Bank Secrecy Act[121] by failing to maintain an effective anti-money-laundering program, which resulted in at least $881 million in drug-trafficking proceeds of Mexican and Colombian cartels being laundered through HSBCs U.S. subsidiary.[122] Additionally, the government alleged that HSBC facilitated financial transactions, valued in the aggregate at approximately $660 million, on behalf of countries including Iran, Cuba, Sudan, Libya, and Myanmar in violation of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act[123] and the Trading with the Enemy Act.[124]
In accordance with the agreement, HSBC must forfeit $1.256 billion, a record penalty for a Bank Secrecy Act prosecution, along with $665 million in civil penalties.[125] Most of the comprehensive compliance program detailed in the agreement was already in place prior to the DPA, under the pressure of a looming indictment,[126] most likely in an effort by HSBC leadership to show good-faith cooperation by the company as the government built its case. These self-initiated changes were sweeping, including a significant shake-up of the executive team, involving the replacement of almost all senior management,[127] the decrease and deferral of executive bonuses, and the implementation of a new system tying senior executive bonuses to compliance standards.[128] In addition to a $244 million investment in anti-money-laundering efforts in 2011 by HSBC Bank USA (approximately nine times more than it had spent in 2009), the company dramatically increased staffing devoted to prevent money laundering (from 92 full-time employees and 25 consultants as of January 2010 to approximately 880 full-time employees and 267 consultants as of May 2012),[129] and it made a $700 million remediation investment,[130] completely revamping its Know Your Customer system. The company also made other changes to reporting, compliance standards, management structure, and general business practices.[131]
The DPA also features terms that have become almost boilerplate. HSBC must retain an independent compliance monitor for the entire five-year term at the companys expense, to be approved by the DOJ.[132] The DOJ will also require regular reporting from the monitor and have the sole discretion in deciding disputes or reporting difficulties between the company and the monitor.[133] Though there are confidentiality protections, the DOJ can override those protections if it determines that disclosure would be in furtherance of the Departments discharge of its duties and responsibilities or is otherwise required by law.[134] The compliance requirements in the aggregate reveal that the DOJ retains control over the work of the monitor, with the sole discretion to make any changes or demands with regard to HSBCs compliance, without much regard for shareholder value or ordinary business practices. This broad discretion retained solely by the DOJ is a recurring element in the HSBC agreement, appearing in terms that govern information requests, determine a breach of the agreement, and determine whether to extend the agreement, among other terms.[135]
Issue 4. The Global Sweep of Enforcement
The RLC and other FCPA-based NPAs and DPAs demonstrate the global sweep of modern U.S. prosecutorial enforcementin some cases, targeting foreign
subsidiaries of foreign companies for foreign bribes, on the flimsiest of jurisdictional links to the United States[136]but
perhaps no case exemplifies this trend more than the DOJs DPAs with RBS and HSBC. RBS is 82 percent owned by the British government, and although
some controls have been put into place to mitigate the effect of the monetary penalty on taxpayer funds, the DOJ is nevertheless effectively
regulating an entity owned by a foreign sovereign.[137] In the HSBC case, the DOJ in essence offered the bank a Hobsons
choice between losing its license to practice as a bank in the U.S. and pulling out of hosts of emerging-market countriesexerting a dramatic
influence over the course of global development policy.
In the RBS case, the DOJ justifies its jurisdiction by citing the impact of the LIBOR scandals on U.S. investors.[138] The
LIBOR affects financial products owned by U.S. counterparties such as asset-management companies, insurance companies, universities, and nonprofits,
which thus may have been affected by the alleged rate manipulation.[139] Even if this real economic impact is sufficient to
create a jurisdictional basis for DOJ involvement, the sweep of the RBS DPAincluding prior restraints on speech and aggressive record keeping and
oversight by American prosecutorsis striking in the context of a bank mostly owned by an allied world power with permanent United Nations Security
Council status. Such is particularly the case in light of recent British reforms giving the U.K. government power to enter into its own DPA
agreements, even retroactively (see Part III, infra).[140]
In addition, precisely because of LIBORs impact on international business transactions, the DOJs aggressive oversight of interest rates
embedded in hosts of commercial contracts is cause for concern. Though it is doubtless problematic that a critical interest rate like LIBOR may have
been manipulated for profit by a rate-providing bank, oversight of such concerns would seem better suited to the U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve,
as well as the U.K. and European monetary authorities, rather than criminal and antitrust lawyers in the U.S. Department of Justice. Putting a
critical international monetary-policy instrument under the forceful regulatory thumb of government lawyers with limited financial and economic
expertise could involve systemic risks and should be grounds for caution.
In the HSBC case, the banks most significant changes lie in what the company wont be doing: HSBCs U.S. subsidiary has exited 109 correspondent
relationships for risk reasons. Since January 2011, HSBC has sold 42 businesses, and the bank has completely withdrawn from nine countries (including
Iraq) and adopted a new, more rigorous, set of guidelines assessing the risks of doing business in particular countries.[141]
Under these guidelines, the bank has abandoned an array of business activities in parts of Asia and Latin America where knowing your customer is
expensive and not always conclusive,[142] and it has decided not to enter high-risk countries such as Myanmar and Angola,
despite encouragement from those countries respective governments.[143] Big global banks like HSBC are necessary partners for
unconnected local lenders and fill critical gaps in economically undeveloped regions,[144] but in light of the DOJs
criminal-enforcement regime, the risks for such banks are now outweighing the potential benefits in many of the worlds poorest nations.
Issue 5. (The Lack of) Judicial Oversight
Federal agreements not to take companies to trial on criminal charges are notable for their lack of judicial oversightan omission highlighted in
the exception in the HSBC case, in which the supervising judge, John Gleeson of the Eastern District of New York, issued a striking decision
asserting his supervisory authority. In a December 20, 2012, hearing to approve the DPA[145]typically a pro forma affairJudge
Gleeson decided not to rubber-stamp the agreement. Instead, he instructed the parties to submit arguments articulating the proper role of the court
with regard to DPAs.[146] With the DOJ understandably loathe to relinquish its authority and HSBC anxious to move forward,
both parties argued that the courts actual supervisory discretion was severely cabined: both parties contended that the judges singular role was
to grant a delay to the Speedy Trial Act[147] to exclude the requirement that the trial must start within 70 days of the
date that prosecutors bring charges.[148]
On July 1, 2013, Judge Gleeson approved the agreement but not before asserting his judicial authority to oversee its terms. In the 20-page opinion,
he agreed with the governments argument that there was no explicit authority for the Court to accept or reject DPAs pursuant to the Federal Rules of
Civil Procedure or U.S. Sentencing Guidelines, but he invoked an inherent supervisory power of the Court, citing numerous precedents to support the
assertion of authority.[149] Though Gleeson acknowledged that the decision to prosecute or to enter an NPA was in the absolute
discretion of the DOJ, he explained that DPAs were different:
The government has chosen neither of those paths. Rather, it has built into the DPA with HSBC a criminal prosecution that will remain pending
(assuming all goes well) for at least five years. Just as a non-prosecution agreement is perceived as a public relations benefit to a company,
perhaps the filing and maintenance of criminal charges was intended to produce a public relations benefit for the government. But for whatever reason
or reasons, the contracting parties have chosen to implicate the Court in their resolution of this matter. There is nothing wrong with that, but a
pending federal criminal case is not window dressing. Nor is the Court, to borrow a famous phrase, a potted plant. By placing a criminal matter
on the docket of a federal court, the parties have subjected their DPA to the legitimate exercise of that courts authority.
Gleeson observed that DPAs infringe on the rights of criminal defendants and pose significant risks. [I]t is easy to imagine circumstances in
which a deferred prosecution agreement, or the implementation of such an agreement, so transgresses the bounds of lawfulness or propriety as to
warrant judicial intervention to protect the integrity of the Court,[151] wrote the judge, citing earlier agreements that
had required companies to waive attorney-client privilege and work-product protections, as well as the Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights of their
employees.[152] Gleesons opinion further noted that prosecutors might improperly allocate remediation funds or make
nepotistic corporate monitor appointments,[153] and he emphasized that judicial oversight was especially necessary, given
that that corporate defendants facing a DPA would be very unlikely to rais[e] a purported impropriety, given the risk that speaking up might
derail the agreement with the government.[154]
III. International Perspective: DPAs in the United Kingdom
As exemplified by the DPA and NPA examples in Part IIinvolving two British banks, a British pharmaceutical company, and the foreign actions of a foreign subsidiary of a U.S. companythe U.S. governments corporate criminal enforcement regime has global scope. Although many European nations laws do not permit criminal prosecutions of corporate entities in any form,[155] the U.K. in the 1950s passed laws permitting companies to be prosecuted criminally.[156] Just last year, the U.K. passed the Crime and Courts Act,[157] which introduced DPAs to the British criminal justice system.[158] Slated to take effect in February 2014,[159] the new British DPA rules borrow fromand, in notable ways, are distinct fromthose developed over the past two decades of American practice.[160]
In the U.K., corporate criminal prosecutions are limited by the identification principle,[161] which requires that prosecutors prove both an element of intent (mens rea) and that the intent was attributable to someone representing the directing mind and will of the company.[162] Although the structural definition of a DPA and its key components under the new U.K. rules track the U.S. model,[163] the U.K. legislation permits prosecutors to enter into DPAs only with corporations, partnerships, or unincorporated associations, not with individuals.[164] The U.K.s new DPA authority is also limited in scope, applying only to the essentially economic crimes listed in the laws Schedule 17, such as fraud, bribery, and money launderingas opposed to U.S. practice, in which DPAs are regularly entered into to resolve environmental or health infractions and a host of other substantive offenses.[165] The new U.K. rules also limit the DPA tool to prosecutors; civil enforcement agencies are not permitted to enter into DPAs with companies.[166]
The new U.K. DPA Code of Practice sets out a two-stage test to determine whether a DPA is appropriate in the given circumstances.[167] First, in the evidentiary stage, prosecutors must evaluate whether they have enough evidence that the corporation has committed a crime to justify continuing an investigation into the conduct.[168] Second, in the public interest stage, prosecutors must determine that public interest would be properly served by entering into a DPA rather than prosecuting a corporation, taking into account a list of factors provided by the Code, including the risk of harm to the public, to unidentified victims, shareholders, employees and creditors and to the stability and integrity of financial markets and international trade, the risk of debarment from entering into government contracts, and the corporations cooperation with the investigation.[169]
In contrast to the general practice in the U.S., the U.K. DPA law requires robust judicial review in every major phase of the DPA process.[170] First, negotiations between prosecutors and the company must be well documented; no offer or concession may be excluded from this requirement. After negotiations are initiated, prosecutors must apply to the court[171]at a preliminary hearing held in privatefor a declaration that entering into a DPA with the company is likely to be in the interests of justice and the proposed terms of the DPA are fair, reasonable and proportionate.[172] The presiding judgeone of a limited pool selected to adjudicate DPAs[173]must not only approve or reject this application but offer reasoning to the parties for the decision.[174]
If the court approves the preliminary application, prosecutors and the company are then free to finalize all the terms of the DPA, after which they must resubmit it to the court for consideration.[175] At a final hearing, which may also be held in private,[176] prosecutors must seek a declaration that the DPA is in the interests of justice and that its terms are fair, reasonable and proportionate.[177] The DPA is not effective until the judge approves the application and articulates the reasons for the decision, in open court.[178] The prosecutors must then publish the DPA, the courts preliminary declaration and its reasoning, and the courts final declaration approving the DPA with reasoning.[179] Any subsequent modifications to the DPA or any finding of breach requires the courts permission, and the court again must make its decisions public and apply the same two-step test as in the initial hearings.[180] At the completion of the DPA term, the prosecutor must then send notice to the Crown Court that it will not prosecute the company and then publish this declination along with details of the companys compliance.[181]
In terms of sanctions, the U.K.s new DPA law expressly ties monetary penalties to the fine that a court would levy on the company if it pleaded guilty to the offense.[182] Sentencing guidelines provide ranges for prosecutors to refer to when negotiating these penalties, relyingsimilar to U.S. practiceon metrics of harm and culpability.[183] Additional guidelines specify that these fines could be supplemented with compensation for victims of the corporate wrongdoing and the payment of prosecution costs among other possible disbursements; yet the company would also be eligible to receive a one-third discount for entering into the agreement, similar to the U.K law governing plea deals.[184] The provisions allowing for the appointment of a corporate monitor are also defined, with the court involved in supervising the selection process, which the company must lead at its own expense.[185] The company and prosecutors must provide a detailed work plan for the corporate monitors responsibilities in the first year and a general outline for the entire term, which must be approved by the court.[186]
IV. Assessment and Conclusion
With little fanfare, over a period spanning only a decade, the widespread use of DPAs and NPAs has emerged as the new normal in federal regulation of businesswhat might be deemed a shadow regulatory state. Government attorneysoften only a few years out of law schoolhave been prompting major shifts in business practices to some of our nations largest companiesindeed, entire industriesbased on vague criminal laws, with minimal congressional guidance or judicial oversight.
As shown in the case studies examined in this report, federal prosecutors regularly insist on significant changes to business practice. Changes to compensation practices can reach the most senior executives, and entire management teams have been replaced to placate prosecutorial demands.
Businesses operating in this environment tend to face a minefield without a map. Companies cannot afford to test novel or strained interpretations of the law in court, owing to the staggering collateral consequences from conviction (which include loss of bank licenses, debarment from federal contracting, or exclusion from federal reimbursement), which affords prosecutors broad discretion to interpret what constitutes a crime, without judicial review. Moreover, the government almost always drafts DPAs and NPAs to vest in prosecutors the sole discretion to determine whether the company has breached the agreement[187] which companies can ill afford to challenge, even when the government is applying vague or ambiguous compliance terms like rigorous, appropriate, or adequate.
Complicating the ability of companies to comply with the law, the use of DPAs, NPAs, and similar agreements by the federal government has spread to new divisions within the DOJ (notably, the Antitrust Division, as shown in the RBS agreement) and has become well entrenched with the SEC and the Department of Health and Human Services (as shown, respectively, in the RLC and GSK agreements). The overlapping jurisdictions all seeking to regulate corporations through the threat of prosecution subject businesses to multipleand, in some cases, conflictinginterpretations of legal rules. As in the Ralph Lauren example, aggressive compliance programs and self-reporting of potential violations do not insulate companies from prospective prosecutioneven when prosecutors published guidelines would seem to signal that a decision to seek a DPA or an NPA is not appropriate.
Prosecutors decisions in this area can have broad impacts beyond those on companies and their owners. Some are obvious, including collateral consequences for employees, creditors, and other stakeholdersthe very concerns that, in part, encourage the federal government to enter into such agreements on a widespread basis in the first place. Others are more systemic, including those touched upon in this report, including:
In each of these cases, serious policy issues are at play. There is a strong policy need to police market manipulation, money laundering, and bribery. That said, there is strong reason to question the competence of government prosecutors with little business experience or economic training to assess the economic and social impacts of their effectively regulatory judgments.
There is a strong case for limiting prosecutors ability to enter into corporate DPAs or NPAs in cases involving predicate offenses committed by senior business officials, for ensuring that companies are properly credited for preexisting compliance programs, and for scaling back statutory collateral consequences that effectively force companies to acquiesce to prosecutors demands.[188] Beyond such substantive limitations on DPA practice, there is a strong case for procedural reforms to ensure greater transparency and oversight over the DPA process. A notable feature of U.S. criminal law enforcement as applied to businesses is that it lacks transparency and vests almost exclusive authority with prosecutors. With strict procedural guidelines, mandated transparency, and required judicial oversight, the U.K.s new DPA rules offer an alternative that U.S. policymakers would be wise to consider. It is too soon to observe the effects of the transparency and oversight provisions at the center of the U.K. DPA, but we should watch the U.K. process as it plays outwith an eye on the impact on companies share value, profitability, and public reputation.[189]
As was the case with HSBC before Judge Gleeson, in manyif not mostindividual cases, a company is likely to prefer to avoid judicial oversight: the company has reached a settlement agreement that it deems acceptable under the circumstances, and there is risk that the judge might deem its terms too lenient. Indeed, at the heart of Gleesons opinion was a concern that corporations are getting off too easy, a sentiment shared by other federal judges recently challenging other federal DPAs and government enforcement actions, such as Terrence Boyle in North Carolina[190] and Judge Jed Rakoff in New York.[191]
Overall, however, our critique of the federal DPA process does not hinge on a belief that it treats corporations too harshlythough, in particular instances, such as off-label drug promotion, that is almost certainly the case. Yet if one were to believe as a normative matter that the government generally is not doing enough to regulate large corporations, the DPA process may be part of the problem. Complex regulatory questions are not best left to the unilateral judgment of prosecutors outside the public eye.
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Houston County Courier - Local News
Stories Added - August 2009
Copyright 2009 - Polk County Publishing Company
No tax increase for CISD
Houston County Courier - August 2009
By Daphne Hereford
Managing Editor
In a special called meeting that lasted about 15 minutes on Thursday, Aug. 13, members of Crockett Independent School District Board of Trustees approved a proposed tax rate of $1.22496 which is no increase from the previous year.
Of the proposed tax rate, $1.04 will be utilized for maintenance and operation while $.18496 will be used for interest and the sinking fund.
Trustees voted to hold the public hearing for the budget and proposed tax rate on Tuesday, Aug. 25.
In other business, it was announced that longtime CISD employee Family and Consumer Science Teacher Roberta Mason would be retiring.
Trustee James Berry was absent from the meeting.
Polk County Publishing Company
Copyright 2009
Contact Us: firstname.lastname@example.com
Call us at - (936) 327-4357
Webmaster: Gregg Faith


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Accelerator - Startup Weekend Style Assignments, Week 4
We are four weeks in and the teams are progressing nicely. We had another week focused on Customer Discovery where the teams have been talking to a lot of potential customers and continuing to refine their segments. MVPs are getting built and several teams are moving into Customer Validation. One team flew to India to meet with potential customers for a few days and also dropped in on Telerik India!
We had two mentors come in this week, one was a talk by a local entrepreneur who decided to walk away from his business after his partner and investor changed the terms and would not negotiate. His only course of action was to walk away from the business and the story was very powerful. We also had Steven Kopec from Turner Broadcasting Asia come in and work with the teams 1:1.
We also had the third installment of Paul and Steve's "Early Stage Venture Survival" talk at the Good Lab, which was open to the public. Paul spoke for two hours on the value of metrics to a startup. (And how to avoid vanity metrics.)
We also did our first batch of Pecha Kuchas, one team member even did one on Austrian Economics. Paul has also started to pronounce Pecha Kuchas properly, giving up his futile attempt to change the native Japanese pronunciation of the word.
On Friday we did our weekly check-in and changed it up by having people do an elevator pitch for a team that they were not a member of!
After our checkin we went to a BBQ hosted by one of the teams on the rooftop of one of our mentors.
Next week we start to take a look at the MVPs, and we have some mentors coming in for the +30. Prototype Day presentations. (Can you believe that we are at this a month already?!?!) Stay tuned…
Published at DZone with permission of {{ articles[0].authors[0].realName }}, DZone MVB. (source)
Opinions expressed by DZone contributors are their own.


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42 U.S. Code § 11131 - Requiring reports on medical malpractice payments
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(a) In general
Each entity (including an insurance company) which makes payment under a policy of insurance, self-insurance, or otherwise in settlement (or partial settlement) of, or in satisfaction of a judgment in, a medical malpractice action or claim shall report, in accordance with section 11134 of this title, information respecting the payment and circumstances thereof.
(b) Information to be reported
The information to be reported under subsection (a) of this section includes—
(1) the name of any physician or licensed health care practitioner for whose benefit the payment is made,
(3) the name (if known) of any hospital with which the physician or practitioner is affiliated or associated,
(4) a description of the acts or omissions and injuries or illnesses upon which the action or claim was based, and
(c) Sanctions for failure to report
Any entity that fails to report information on a payment required to be reported under this section shall be subject to a civil money penalty of not more than $10,000 for each such payment involved. Such penalty shall be imposed and collected in the same manner as civil money penalties under subsection (a) ofsection 1320a–7a of this title are imposed and collected under that section.
(d) Report on treatment of small payments
The Secretary shall study and report to Congress, not later than two years after November 14, 1986, on whether information respecting small payments should continue to be required to be reported under subsection (a) of this section and whether information respecting all claims made concerning a medical malpractice action should be required to be reported under such subsection.
Source(Pub. L. 99–660, title IV, § 421,Nov. 14, 1986, 100 Stat. 3788.)
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BOWLING GREEN, Ky. — Under nearly perfect conditions for football in Bowling Green on Wednesday, the Hilltoppers enjoyed their second practice of the spring season, noticeably increasing their tempo on both sides of the ball as the session went along.
Spring football on The Hill is brought to you by the Kentucky Office of Highway Safety's: Don't Text and Drive Awareness Program. All practices are open to the public and will be capped off by the annual Red and White Spring Game, April 19 at 1 p.m.
Defense was the focus on the day for the assembled media after practice as they met with associate head coach and defensive coordinator Nick Holt to discuss his defense which finished as the best in the Sun Belt last season.
"It's really good to be back. It seems like we haven't done any football stuff in forever," said Associate Head Coach and Defensive Coordinator Nick Holt. "We're on a mission (as coaches) here. We've got to get a lot better here because we lost some key guys, but that's the way college football is. You have to get the young guys to step up."


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Domestic Airport in India
India is recognized as a growing economy and a major country in Asia that is fast developing to be the most developed economy. In order to maintain the position in the Asian sub-continent and the rest of the world, proper Air ports are said to play a significant part in enhancing the economy and growth of the country.
Airports in India
Growth of the state depends on the modes of transport, which include roads, waterways and airways. Today there is an acute need for faster mode of transport that can help people commute faster and help in their business. There are many domestic airports and international airports in India. They help in fulfilling the requirements of the visitors as well as the tourist who arrive here and also commute within the country. All the states have at least one major international airport and two or more domestic airports. There are nearly 12 International airports and domestic airports can be seen in all major cities of India and the capital cities. The country boasts of around 80 domestic airports which connect the vast nation. All the airports are well equipped with high tech equipments and have modernized facilities.
Use of airports
Today millions of people use domestic as well as international airports to travel long and short distance as it is convenient and the fastest mode of transport. Air travel is now preferred by many businessmen and tourists who want to reach their destination quickly and with the best of comfort. Fast travel helps in the growth of economy of the country and gives many benefits to the individuals as well.
Last Updated on 05 June 2012


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- Eastern Group Publications/EGPNews - http://egpnews.com -
Senators' Panic on Immigration Over Boston Bombings Makes No Sense
Posted By admin On April 25, 2013 @ 11:38 am In Bell Gardens,Bell Gardens Sun,Boyle Heights,City of Commerce,City of Los Angeles,City Terrace,City Terrace Comet,Commerce Comet,County of Los Angeles,Cypress Park,Eagle Rock,East Los Angeles (LA City),East Los Angeles (Unincorp.),Eastside Sun,Editorial & Opinion,El Monte,El Sereno,ELA Brooklyn Belvedere Comet,Glassell Park,Hermon,Highland Park,Lincoln Heights,Maywood,Mexican American Sun,Montebello,Montebello Comet,Monterey Park,Monterey Park Comet,Mt. Washington,Northeast Los Angeles,Northeast Sun,Pico Rivera,Southeast Los Angeles,Vernon,Vernon Sun,Wyvernwood Chronicle | No Comments
It didn't take long for some members of Congress to jump to the wrong conclusion following the horrific Boston Marathon bombing and to start claiming that Americans would be in danger from more attacks of this type if a new and comprehensive immigration law under consideration is allowed to pass.
Two brothers, Chechen refugees from Russia, were responsible for the bombings and terrible carnage in Boston, and were rather quickly identified after a robbery and carjacking. Much was quickly learned about the brothers because their presence in the US was well documented. While they may have felt isolated and little in common with Americans, they were not living in the shadows as most undocumented immigrants in this country do today.
We think these facts should lead to the realization that every person in the U.S. must be documented not only because it makes a country less secure to have an underground population, undocumented, unlicensed, untaxed and unidentified, but because it also divides the country's people.
You have to wonder if some of the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee who panicked after the Boston attack have had their heads constricted by Washington's beltway.
It's time to stop the nonsensical rhetoric, and get on with the reforms needed in our immigration system.
Article printed from Eastern Group Publications/EGPNews: http://egpnews.com
URL to article: http://egpnews.com/2013/04/senators%e2%80%99-panic-on-immigration-over-boston-bombings-makes-no-sense/
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Today's StyleDish tells the tale of a Harry Potter bromance. Be still our hearts! There are also details about Oprah's new office, a hot army-medic-turned-model, and Lauren Conrad's clothing line.
Amusingly Played, Ron Fugsley [Go Fug Yourself]
The Sex And The City Prequel Explained! And A Quiz. [The Gloss]
This Is Oprah's New Office? [Mogulite]
Caesar Stovall, Army Medic Turned Givenchy Model [The Moment]
Lauren Conrad Talks Building Paper Crown Clothing Line, Debuting Saturday [MTV Style]
From Nails to Makeup: More New Fall Collections From NARS, Estée Lauder, Duri, Lancome, And…Hello Kitty [Fashionista]
Bonus! Today is Super Saturday! Here is Kim Kardashian's message about the ovarian cancer awareness initiative:


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Recently, I've really been getting into programming. I've always loved it, but now it's all I think about. 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And now that I'm working a lot and about to graduate and get a full time job, I'm looking to sharpen those skills.
Lately, all of my programming has been in Java and Javascript. I've nearly mastered the quirks of Javascript, but I'm still "new" to Java. I've written a lot of code, but I don't know the ins and outs. (For instance, I just discovered the try with resources statement.)
TL;DR - I'm looking for some articles to hone my Java skills and really know the ins and outs of the language. Anything from refactoring tips to advanced security guides to performance optimizations. Where can I go to become a better Java programmer. (Besides my IDE. I spend enough time there. :p )


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Hey All,It looks like Gossamer Gear (disclaimer: trail ambassador) has put a bunch of things up for sale for the holiday.Including two of their backpacks:
Actually, if you look up to the top of GG site, you'll see:"10% off all items in stock during the Holiday Weekend. Have a wonderful and safe 4th of July! — Thank You — GG staff"Everything is on sale. You won't see the discount for the other backpacks till you click through as there are per item prices. Oddly, this doesn't seem to be reflected in the Kumo.
+1 Tom I noticed that as well.
+1 for myself... I tried adding a whole bunch of things to my shopping cart and none of them showed the 10% discount. I went all the way through the payment page until the very final "pay" button, and nothing indicated a 10% discount on everything. Maybe they are issuing a refund post-payment??
Maybe their website admin is on vacation?
I hate sites that do this. They say the price starts at $27 for a pack but then you look and its just a hipbelt. I know I wont get a backpack for $27 but I hate when companies do this.
Maybe it starts at $27 for a hipbelt because some people have their gear weights and volumes down so low that all they need are the zippered pockets.
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We have over 12,000 students, from over 100 countries, within one of the safest campuses in the UK
97% of Lancaster students go into work or further study within six months of graduating
Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article
|Journal publication date
|Journal of Computational and Theoretical Nanoscience
|Number of pages
|Original language
A critical analysis of point-contact Andreev reflection (PCAR) in ferromagnet/superconductor ballistic junctions is presented, based on tight-binding Hamiltonians with s, p and d orbitals and material-specific parameters. By accurately modeling the band structure of the bulk materials, we show that to reproduce the measured differential conductance of Cu/Pb and Co/Pb nanocontacts(1,2) one needs a detailed understanding of interface parameters which goes beyond simple averages of bulk matrix elements. As an example of how such a modification of surface parameters can affect spin-polarized transport, we explore the effect of an enhancement of the surface magnetization and show that this can significantly improve agreement with experiment. We also demonstrate that in general the spin polarization P of the junction may be different from the bulk polarization 15 of the magnetic metal used. For bulk Co we find (P) over bar = -0.4, whereas for the Co/Pb interface P = +0.4 and for the Co/Ir interface P = -0.01.


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6284 photos found.
orange you glad? by Ty Tagliapietra
Oranges to Orange Juice by Suzy Mack
Orange Cat on Orange Tile by Lesley Silvia
red orange or orange red? by Carroll Pierce
Orange red or Red Orange by Vic Stapel
Oranges by roi brooks
Orange by Mohammed Ali AlQahtani
Orange by Kelly Bryant
Orange by Mike Thompson
Rock beside the orange water, under the orange sky by Daniel Ryczek
How many Oranges does it take to make ONE glass of DAMN Orange Juice by Howard Seelig
Orange Flowers by renin lagrio
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The concept of dumb terminals is not new. They were heralded by some as the next big thing in the '80s, and cloud computing has brought the idea back to the forefront, and I'm Circle is taking this concept to the extreme.
This concept comes from Italy-based I'm Circle, the people behind the I'm Watch, and it looks to be the brains of phones, tablets, media players, PCs and more in one box called the I'm Core. Dubbed "the first wireless, multi-device, single processor system," I'm Circle looks to creative a digital ecosystem that interacts with a myriad of wireless devices to create a cohesive, integrated experience however data is accessed.
The arguent here is that "75 % of the functions of the devices you use, every day, are identical and overlapping," and that may not be far off. Vagaries and logistics aside, this is an interesting concept. As mobile processors become more powerful, running all devices off of the same "core" makes sense, especially when considering that only one device is likely be accessed at once.
I'm Circle details four different devices on its site, the I'm Core (the CPU device), I'm Screen (smartphone), I'm View (tablet), I'm Vision (monitor), and I'm Cinema (set-top box and charger).
The I'm Circle family is slated as coming in late 2012. Ah, aren't those blue skies pretty.
Source: I'm Circle | Via: The Verge


text: Joe Raedle/Getty Images Sunday Alcohol Sales Won't be Expanded in Mitchell By Associated Press August 5, 2014 The Mitchell City Council has rejected a proposal to expand Sunday alcohol sales in the city. Read More|Comment Category: Articles Tags: alcohol, Mitchell Send to a friend! Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Pin it! Reddit This! Share on Tumblr!