e The company discovered that its employees had received competitor bid information from a third party with connections to the foreign government.
e The company began an internal investigation, withdrew its contract bid, terminated the employees involved, severed ties to the third-party agent, and voluntarily disclosed the conduct to DOJ’s Antitrust Division, which also declined prosecution.
e During the internal investigation, the company uncovered various FCPA red flags, including prior concerns about the third-party agent, all of which the company voluntarily disclosed to DOJ and SEC.
e Thecompany immediately took substantial steps to
improve its compliance program.
Example 2: Public Company Declination
DOJ and SEC declined to take enforcement action against a public U.S. company. Factors taken into consider- ation included:
e With knowledge of employees of the company’s subsidiary, a retained construction company paid relatively small bribes, which were wrongly approved by the company’s local law firm, to for- eign building code inspectors.
e When the company’s compliance department learned of the bribes, it immediately ended the conduct, terminated its relationship with the con- struction company and law firm, and terminated or disciplined the employees involved.
e The company completed a thorough internal inves- tigation and voluntarily disclosed to DOJ and SEC.
e The company reorganized its compliance depart- ment, appointed a new compliance officer dedi- cated to anti-corruption, improved the training and compliance program, and undertook a review of all of the company’s international third-
party relationships.
Example 3: Public Company Declination DOJ and SEC declined to take enforcement action
against a USS. publicly held industrial services company for
Resolutions
bribes paid by a small foreign subsidiary. Factors taken into consideration included:
e The company self-reported the conduct to DOJ and SEC.
e The total amount of the improper payments was relatively small, and the activity appeared to be an isolated incident by a single employee at the subsidiary.
e The profits potentially obtained from the improper payments were very small.
e The payments were detected by the company’s existing internal controls. The company’s audit committee conducted a thorough independent internal investigation. The results of the investiga- tion were provided to the government.
e The company cooperated fully with investigations by DOJ and SEC.
e The company implemented significant remedial
actions and enhanced its internal control structure.
Example 4: Public Company Declination
DOJ and SEC declined to take enforcement action against a U.S. publicly held oil-and-gas services company for small bribes paid by a foreign subsidiary’s customs agent. Factors taken into consideration included:
e The company’s internal controls timely detected a potential bribe before a payment was made.
e When company management learned of the potential bribe, management immediately reported the issue to the company’s General Counsel and Audit Committee and prevented the payment from occurring.
e Within weeks of learning of the attempted bribe, the company provided in-person FCPA training
to employees of the subsidiary and undertook
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