Whistleblower News From The Inside -- May 24, 2018

By the C|C Whistleblower Lawyer Team

Lucky Breaks For A SEC Whistleblower — When the General Counsel of the company resigned, the three remaining in-house lawyers met in his vacant office to decide who would be responsible for his various duties. The only former SEC attorney on staff, I volunteered to serve as interim Director of Compliance of my employer, a SEC-registered mutual fund adviser. No one in the room particularly wanted, or, for that matter, wanted to avoid, responsibility for compliance oversight. Compliance was a “dead zone” prior to the mutual fund scandals of the early 2000s. Regulators rarely punished fund advisers for non-compliance with the federal securities laws and, as a result, fund adviser compliance efforts were generally lacking. Forbes

Malaysia’s Anti-Graft Agents Take ex-PM’s Statement, Meet Whistleblower — Former Malaysian premier Najib Razak, whose near 10-year rule ended two weeks ago, returned to an anti-graft agency on Thursday to resume his explanation for the suspicious transfers of $10.6 million dollars into his bank account. The sum represents just a fraction of billions of dollars that went missing from 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), a state fund founded by Najib, in a scandal that was a key reason why voters dumped him in an election on May 9. Entering the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, the embattled 64-year-old Najib appeared relaxed, smiling and waving as he walked through a throng of journalists. Elsewhere in the building, agents met with Xavier Justo, a Swiss national who was the first whistleblower in the 1MDB affair. Journalists saw Justo in the lobby half an hour before Najib arrived. Reuters

‘Whistleblower’ Taped to Chair and Gagged — A woman who complained of a racist and misogynistic culture in a Scottish government department claims she was taped to a chair and gagged by two male colleagues as a warning to keep quiet. DeeAnn Fitzpatrick said the restraint took place amid years of bullying and harassment at Marine Scotland’s Scrabster office. The fisheries officer has taken her case to an employment tribunal. BBC Scotland has obtained a photo of the restraint incident. It was taken by one of the men allegedly responsible. BBC News