Forensic Risk Alliance

FRA has opened new offices in Asia and the Middle East over the past 12 months as it continues to build on two decades of investigations experience that has seen the firm act on many of the biggest foreign bribery settlements and monitorships.

The firm

FRA has gone from strength to strength since its launch. It has 12 offices worldwide, routinely lands roles on the biggest multinational bribery cases and has been involved in more than a dozen corporate monitorships. It has cemented its position as a top choice for major law firms and companies to advise on high-profile corruption, sanctions and bribery matters, providing forensic accounting and e-discovery expertise.

The firm is a three-time winner of the GIR Award for Investigations Consultancy of the Year, in 2016, 2017 and 2020, and was nominated for the 2022 award.

Founding partner Frances McLeod is among a select few who have been appointed for not one but two DOJ-imposed compliance monitorships. Based in Washington, DC, she leads FRA’s offices in the US. She is a GIR Women in Investigations 2018 nominee, is ranked in GIR’s Top FCPA Practitioners, and features in Who’s Who Legal: Investigations.

The other co-founding partners, Toby Duthie in London and Greg Mason in Providence, were part of the FRA team acting for Airbus on its record multilateral bribery settlement announced in early 2020. Duthie and McLeod are both recognised as forensic investigations Thought Leaders by Who’s Who Legal. In total, the publication has recognised 13 FRA professionals in various expert consultant categories, including the impressive Yousr Khalil, praised by multiple clients for her expertise, who leads the Paris office and was responsible for the forensic accounting and e-discovery review in the Airbus case. Khalil was named among GIR’s 100 Women in Investigations in 2021.

Other FRA professionals of note in DC include Stacy Fresch, Neil Keenan, Dale Kitchens, and Charlie Steele. Fresch is a former assistant chief accountant at the US SEC and has been appointed as an independent co-monitor in connection with a Public Company Accounting Oversight Board enforcement action.

Prior to joining FRA, Keenan was a partner at PwC, where he led a team assessing damages arising from the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Kitchens has close to four decades of experience in forensic services and is frequently called up as an expert witness. Having served as a senior US Treasury Department and Department of Justice official, partner Charlie Steele also brings extensive government experience to the practice.

Over the past year, the practice has grown significantly with lateral hires and promotions across its offices. Former managing director at Credit Suisse, Gerben Schreurs, came aboard as a partner in Zurich, along with ex-FBI special agent Roy Pollitt in the New York office. Furthermore, London-based experts Gordon Macleod and Weng Yee Ng, along with Samantha Hsu in Texas were promoted to partner.

FRA also expanded its services in the Middle East and Asia in 2022. Bhavin Shah, formerly a partner at Deloitte Middle East, joined FRA in January to head up the brand-new Dubai office. Partner Stephen Millington joined the expanding Middle East and Africa team two months later. In November, FRA announced the opening of another new office in Seoul, South Korea. The firm recruited three local practitioners to run the new office: former KMPG partner Ui-sung Kim, the office’s managing partner; financial analyst Hea-sil Chang, who spent the past six years in the anti-corruption division of the Supreme Prosecutor’s Office; and another KPMG alumni, Young-Gak ‘Ken’ Yun, who joined as a senior adviser.

Recent events

FRA has had another impressive year. It ended 2022 by supporting Switzerland-based ABB in reaching a favourable bribery resolution with authorities in US, Swiss and South Africa in December. The firm was part of a familiar team, working alongside lawyers at Paul Hastings, after previously partnering with the lawyers in precedent-setting resolutions for Airbus and TechnipFMC, among many others.

GIR reported in November that McLeod landed her second DOJ-appointed monitorship when she was appointed as a corporate compliance monitor for Balfour Beatty, a UK-based construction group that pleaded guilty to defrauding the US by falsifying maintenance records. She landed the role shortly after successfully concluding her monitorship of German automotive company IAV GmbH.

The firm's advisory expertise in foreign bribery probes runs deep. In 2021, Duthie and Gordon McLeod helped oil services business Petrofac prepare ability-to-pay submissions for a UK court after the company pleaded guilty to failing to prevent bribery in various middle eastern countries. FRA was the forensic adviser to Airbus in connection with its unprecedented US$4 billion resolution with the UK’s SFO, the French National Financial Prosecutor’s Office, the US DOJ and the US State Department to resolve alleged bribery and export control violations. Duthie has also advised Airbus’ GPT subsidiary in connection with a UK investigation that led to a guilty plea and a £30 million fine in April 2021.

Network

FRA has 12 offices around the world in cities including London, Paris, New York, Washington, DC, Dallas, Dubai and Seoul.

Clients

FRA has acted for Airbus, Swedbank, Petrofac, Rolls-Royce, Swedish telecommunications company Telia, French engineering company Technip, US oil and gas services company Weatherford International and oil company Total, among many others.

Track record

Name almost any international bribery investigation in the past decade and FRA has had a role in it. FRA supported the monitorship of Brazilian aircraft maker Embraer, led by Ropes & Gray, worked on the bribery investigation into Telia, and has also acted for French construction company Alstom, chemicals company Innospec, UK engineering company Rolls-Royce and French engineering company Technip.