On Thursday, April 7, 2022, the NAFUSA Annual Conference will feature a panel discussion entitled “Crypto: the Good, the Bad, the Ugly.” It will feature Steve Bunnell, Sean Joyce, Jan Massari and Eun Young Choi. The panel will be moderated by NAFUSA Vice President Ken Wainstein.

Steve Bunnell is the Chief Legal Officer of the Diem Association, a non-profit membership association established to develop a new global blockchain-based payment system that would provide faster, better, and less expensive payments, and promote financial inclusion.   Bunnell was the General Counsel of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security from 2013 to 2017, and has also served as the Chief of the Criminal Division and Chief of the Fraud and Public Corruption Section in the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington, D.C.   He is also the former Managing Partner of O’Melveny & Myers’ Washington office and a former Co-Chair of the firm’s Data Security and Privacy Practic

Bunnell is a Distinguished Fellow of Homeland Security at the Syracuse University College of Law, and a Member of the Council of Foreign Relations.  He received his law degree from Stanford Law School and his B.A. from Yale University.

Sean Joyce is a Principal in PwC’s Consulting Segment, where he is the Global & US Cybersecurity, Risk and Regulatory practice leader and a member of the U.S. Advisory Leadership Team. Sean has worked with clients in various sectors providing strategic guidance, regulatory response, investigative support, incident breach response and cybersecurity advice. Most notably, Sean has consulted in some of the most prolific cyber breaches, providing guidance and expertise to top executives.

Prior to rejoining PwC, Sean was the Chief Trust Officer at Airbnb where he led Design Specialists, Product Managers, Engineers and Data Scientists to help grow and defend the platform. Also, he had responsibility for Privacy and Community Policy. Sean was a member of the Airbnb Executive Committee.

Previously, Sean served as the Deputy Director with the FBI, and had daily oversight of the approximately 36,000 men and women of the FBI and its $8 billion annual budget. With more than 26 years of service in the FBI, Sean brought a wide range of operational and leadership experience. He was an integral part of transforming the FBI into an intelligence-driven organization.  Sean served in many positions during his tenure at the FBI including; the Executive Assistant Director at the FBI’s National Security Branch and lead intelligence official of the FBI, Assistant Director of International Operations, Section Chief of the Counterterrorism Division’s International Terrorism Operations Section, Joint Terrorism Task Force Supervisor, SWAT Team Leader, and Hostage Rescue Team Operator.

A Brockton, MA native, he holds degrees from Boston College and Dartmouth’s Amos Tuck School of Business.

Jai Masari is a partner at Davis Polk & Wardwell, where she is a member of  Financial Institutions and Fintech practices. Major global banks, asset managers and corporations look to Jai for advice on the requirements, impact and implementation of financial regulation. In the area of digital assets and cryptocurrency, she advises financial institutions, fintech firms, tech companies and startups on a wide range of legal and regulatory considerations.

Jai’s work in financial regulation and fintech has been recognized by Chambers, Law360, Euromoney, Global Banking Regulation Review and IFLR1000. A source quoted by Chambers says she “has a unique ability to decompose complex problems and develop elegant solutions” amid varying regulatory frameworks.

Jai serves on the Global Advisory Board of the Women in Law Empowerment Forum and has been a visiting lecturer at Berkeley Law School since 2017.

Ken Wainstein is a partner at Davis Polk & Wardwell, where he focuses his practice on corporate internal investigations and civil and criminal enforcement proceedings.

Ken spent over 20 years in a variety of law enforcement and national security positions in the government.  Between 1989 and 2001, Ken served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in both the Southern District of New York and the District of Columbia, where he handled criminal prosecutions ranging from public corruption to gang prosecution cases and held a variety of supervisory positions, including Acting United States Attorney.  In 2001, he was appointed Director of the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, where he provided oversight and support to the 94 U.S. Attorneys’ Offices.  Between 2002 and 2004, Ken served as General Counsel of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and then as Chief of Staff to Director Robert S. Mueller III.

In 2004, Ken was appointed and then confirmed as United States Attorney for the District of Columbia, where he lead the largest United States Attorney’s Office in the country.  In 2006, the U.S. Senate confirmed Ken as the first Assistant Attorney General for National Security.  In that position, Ken established and led the new National Security Division, which consolidated DOJ’s law enforcement and intelligence activities on counterterrorism and counterintelligence matters.

In 2008, after 19 years at the Justice Department, Ken was named Homeland Security Advisor by President George W. Bush.  In this capacity, he coordinated the nation’s counterterrorism, homeland security, infrastructure protection, and disaster response and recovery efforts.  He advised the President, convened and chaired meetings of the Cabinet Officers on the Homeland Security Council, and oversaw the inter-agency coordination process for homeland security and counterterrorism programs.

Eun Young Choi currently serves as the inaugural Director of the National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team at the Department of Justice, where she leads a team of subject matter experts drawn from across the Department, to identify, investigate, support and pursue the department’s cases involving the criminal use of digital assets; set strategic priorities regarding digital assets technologies; and lead the department’s efforts to coordinate with domestic and international law enforcement partners, regulatory agencies and private industry to combat the criminal use of digital assets. She previously served as Senior Counsel to the Deputy Attorney General, where she was responsible for coordinating and advising on cyber and cryptocurrency-related issues across the Department of Justice, and representing the Department in the development of interagency policy and strategy.

Eun Young began her career at the Department of Justice as an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, where she was the Office’s Cybercrime Coordinator and investigated and prosecuted cyber, fraud, and money laundering crimes, with a particular focus on network intrusions, digital currency, the dark web, and national security investigations.

Prior to her time at the Department, Eun Young was an associate at Williams & Connolly LLP, and served as a law clerk to the Honorable Naomi Reice Buchwald of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, and the Honorable Reena Raggi of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.  She is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School.

NAFUSA Executive Director Rich Rossman has announced that he is stepping down as the executive director of NAFUSA, effective as of the close of the San Diego conference. Rich joined NAFUSA in 1981 and served as president in 2009-2010. He became the 5th NAFUSA executive director in 2011, a post he has held for 11 years.

Rich served as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan (1980-1981).  He previously served as the Chief Assistant U.S. Attorney (1977-1980) and as the Chief Deputy Federal Defender (1972-1975) in Detroit. In 1998-1999, he returned to the Department of Justice, serving as the Chief of Staff in the Criminal Division at Main Justice.  He received his J.D. from the University of Michigan Law School in 1964.

Rich and Patty are retired and live in Northern Michigan in a little resort town named Leland. There isn’t a traffic light in their whole county. Nevertheless, they both intend to continue to be active in the NAFUSA community which includes many of their very best friends.

Monty Wilkinson will speak at the Annual Conference in San Diego with an update on currents activities at EOUSA.

Monty was appointed Director of the Executive Office for United States Attorneys (EOUSA) by Attorney General Merrick B. Garland, on March 14, 2021. The Executive Office, created in 1953, provides general guidance and support to the 94 United States Attorneys’ offices and their more than 12,000 employees.

Prior to being appointed Director, Mr. Wilkinson served as the acting Attorney General from January 20, 2021, until Attorney General Garland was sworn in on March 11, 2021. He previously served as the Director of EOUSA from April 2014 until December 2017 and prior to that as its Principal Deputy Director and Chief of Staff.

During his career with the Department of Justice, Mr. Wilkinson has served as Counselor and Deputy Chief of Staff to the Attorney General, as an Associate Deputy Attorney General, and as the Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Human Resources and Administration. He also held senior management positions for nearly a decade in the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia. Mr. Wilkinson started his career at the Department of Justice in 1990 as a trial attorney in the Criminal Division.

Mr. Wilkinson is a graduate of Dartmouth College and the Georgetown University Law Center. He is the recipient of a Department of Justice Special Achievement Award, a United States Attorney’s Office Distinguished Service Award, and the Attorney General’s Mary C. Lawton Lifetime Service Award.

On February 9, 2022, NAFUSA member Neil MacBride (ED Virginia) was confirmed by the United States Senate (61-33) to be the General Counsel at the Treasury Department. He was nominated to the post by President Biden on June 3, 2021. Before MacBride served as United States Attorney, he served as an Associate Deputy Attorney General at Main Justice and earlier as Chief Counsel to then Senator Joe Biden on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Most recently he has been a litigation partner at Davis Polk & Wardwell and the head of the its Washington office and as co-head of the Firm’s Government Investigations Practice.

According to The New York Times, NAFUSA member Doug Jones (ND Alabama 1997-2001) will serve as a guide for President Biden’s Supreme Court nominee during the Senate confirmation process. Jones was the first Democrat in decades to hold a United States Senate seat in Alabama, and seen by The Times as an olive branch offered by President Biden “as he frequently co-sponsored bipartisan legislation during his three years in the Senate.” Once a nominee is selected, Jones will introduce her to senators and prepare her for hearings.

Jones is a long time member of NAFUSA and would have been installed as president of NAFUSA in 2018 if he hadn’t stepped down to run for the Senate. On April 20, 2021, Doug was featured on a NAFUSA webinar entitled “Justice Delayed Not Justice Denied: The prosecutions of the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing cases.”

The NAFUSA Foundation has created the NAFUSA Foundation Intern Scholarship program which awards $5,000.00 scholarships to unpaid student interns who have performed outstanding work while interning at the United States Attorney’s Offices and the Department of Justice and for their achievements in law school.  The Foundation has awarded its first four scholarships. 

Suzanne Bell, Deputy Director and Chief of Staff of EOUSA, and the U.S. Attorneys’ Offices assisted the Foundation by recommending individuals who met the criteria set out by the Foundation. The recipients of the scholarships are Alana Cammack of the University of Alabama School of Law, nominated by the Middle District of Alabama; Hannah Cho of the University of California, Davis School of Law, nominated by the Western District of Washington; April Hartman of Loyola University, nominated by the EOUSA; and Kathryn Pflug of Notre Dame Law School, nominated by the District of Nebraska. These individuals’ work ethic, positive attitude, professionalism and drive will make them outstanding attorneys with a career path that we hope includes public service.

Thank you to Donna Bucella, Jessie Liu, Rich Rossman, Paul Coggins and Bill Lutz for coordinating these efforts with Foundation President, Edward L. Dowd, Jr.

We are delighted to be able to assist these very deserving young people.

Jerry Martin

On August 2, 2021, the Department of Justice announced that mail-order testing supplier Arriva Medical LLC (Arriva), and its parent, Alere Inc.) Alere) have agreed to pay $160 million to resolve allegations that they violated the False Claims Act. The settlement resolves allegations that Arriva and Alere made, or caused, claims to Medicare that were false because kickbacks were paid to Medicare beneficiaries, patients were ineligible to receive meters, or patients were deceased.

The civil settlement includes the resolution of claims brought under the qui tam or whistleblower provisions of the False Claims Act by Gregory Goodman, a former employee at an Arriva call center in Antioch, Tennessee. Goodman was represented by NAFUSA member Jerry Martin (MD Tennessee 2010-2013). Under the FCA a private party can file an action on behalf of the United States and receive a portion of any recovery. The Act also permits the United States to intervene and take over the litigation. as the government did here. Goodman will receive $28,548,749 as his share of the recovery.

According to the Tennessean, Martin called the win a “true David versus Goliath story,” and  said he was proud to still be able to work with the government of “Team America” from time to time.

Gilbert Stroud Merritt, Jr., the longest-serving member of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals died on Monday, January 17. He was 86.

“Judge Merritt was a cherished friend of my entire family,” former Vice President Al Gore told The Tennessean. “A deeply intelligent and deliberative legal thinker, he was an ardent defender of the liberties that form the foundation of our Constitution…I am holding his family in my thoughts and prayers.”

He sat of the bench for 44 years. He earlier served as the United States Attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee from 1966-1969 under President Lyndon B. Johnson. He received a bachelor of arts degree from Yale University and a bachelor of law from Vanderbilt University Law School. He is survived by three children and three grandchildren.

On June, 26, 2019, NAFUSA former president Hal Hardin interviewed Judge Merritt as part of the oral history project of the Nashville Bar Association.

As is our custom, NAFUSA has requested that an American flag be flown over Main Justice and it will be presented Judge Merritt’s family.