A US law firm, advising its client on a transaction with anti-corruption exposure, instructed an FCPA due-diligence review of the target. The instruction came through counsel because, when corruption risk is assessed around a live deal, a review run under counsel can be protected as legal work product, rather than becoming a stand-alone report that the other side or a regulator could later demand.
“The review examined the target's ownership and history, its government touchpoints, and the people behind it.”
The review, carried out during my tenure at a global investigations firm, examined the target's ownership and history, its government touchpoints, and the record and reputation of the people behind it: the standard FCPA questions, asked before the client's money and name were committed.
Transaction-stage FCPA due diligence combines investigative work in India with a privilege structure that US counsel controls, which is how I work now. Pre-acquisition due diligence of this kind is also what the DOJ and SEC’s Resource Guide to the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act encourages.