Financial Fraud
Sequor Law frequently coordinates multi-jurisdictional investigations and asset recovery efforts with legal, forensic and investigative experts in the United States and other global jurisdictions, leveraging our leadership in the International Chamber of Commerce’s (ICC) FraudNet.
Strategic Legal Responses to
Complex Financial Fraud Schemes
Individuals, businesses, institutions, governments, and government instrumentalities are victimized by financial fraud every day. The losses are staggering, and the effects are often devastating. No one, regardless of sophistication, is fully immune.
When faced with financial fraud, victims must decide whether to act to redress the harm and hold the fraudster and the fraudster’s facilitators accountable. Inaction benefits only the wrongdoer and makes the loss permanent. Sequor Law has built a financial fraud practice focused on helping victims investigate misconduct and pursue effective legal strategies and claims against fraudsters of every kind.
Sequor Law’s financial fraud team frequently leads and coordinates multi-jurisdictional investigations and asset recovery efforts with legal, forensic, and investigative professionals across the Caribbean, Central and South America, Canada, Europe, and Asia. With expertise in finance and accounting and fluency in multiple languages, the team analyzes global evidence in real time and drives cases forward as quickly and cost-effectively as possible.
The firm also maintains tested relationships with third-party litigation funders that can help victims prosecute financial fraud claims against well-funded adversaries.
Real-Time Global Intelligence
Across Languages and Legal Systems
Rapid Global Deployment
Through the World's Premier Fraud Network
Sequor Law leverages its leadership role in the ICC’s FraudNet, the premier financial fraud and asset recovery network in the world. Through this network, whether the fraud’s nexus and the ultimate destination of misappropriated assets are in the United States or elsewhere, the firm can mobilize a truly global response.
Representative
Cases
Sequor Law represents the Joint Liquidators for Stanford International Bank, Ltd. (“SIB”) (in Liquidation). SIB, a bank located in Antigua that primarily sold certificates of deposit, played a central role in a worldwide Ponzi scheme, the second largest in history, perpetrated by Robert Allen Stanford, with losses to depositors estimated to exceed US$4.4 billion. Since May 12, 2011, when Marcus Wide and Hugh Dickson of Grant Thornton were appointed Joint Liquidators of the SIB estate in Antigua, Sequor Law has acted as co-general counsel with Caribbean counsel in global Asset Recovery efforts that have included recovering US$3.2 million from Panama, US$20 million from the United Kingdom, freezing assets in Antigua & Barbuda valued at US$212 million, launching a formal claims process, pursuing claims related to approximately US$330 million in frozen assets in Canada, Switzerland, and the U.K., filing damages claims valued at approximately US$5 billion against a Canadian bank, and initiating recovery efforts in Colombia against law firms and financial institutions. Sequor Law also initiated a Chapter 15 recognition proceeding in Dallas, Texas, and later helped the U.S. Judicial Administrator, the SEC, the U.S. Department of Justice, the Joint Liquidators, and others reach a global agreement and cross-border protocol.
Sequor Law represented a class of 2,232 victims of the Leadenhall Bank & Trust and Cash-4-Titles fraud in the British Virgin Islands and The Bahamas and recovered US$14.4 million. After Leadenhall entered liquidation and was sued in the U.S. District Court in Miami, the class obtained a final money Judgment of US$313 million in September 2007. Enforcement of that Judgment resulted in the US$14.4 million recovery, with approximately US$7 million more to be distributed thereafter.
Sequor Law represented a multinational Colombian food products company in recovering substantial losses for products obtained through fraud and deception. By deploying international treaties and U.S. domestic claims, the firm identified the products, prosecuted the defendants in the United States, and achieved a successful settlement.
Sequor Law represented Créances, S.A.S. (“CDR”), successor to Société de Banque Occidentale (“SDBO”) and an instrumentality of the Republic of France, in a matter involving a nearly US$100 million fraudulent loan transaction that led to the sale of the collateral land without repayment. Sequor Law helped develop the strategy that ultimately led to the recovery of millions of dollars in real estate.
Sequor Law represented the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago in designing the legal strategy for the recovery of assets for the Central Bank of Trinidad and Tobago in the CLICO insurance company corruption scandal.
Sequor Law represents Bancafe International Bank (in Liquidation) (“BIB”). After the failure of Banco Cafeteros de Guatemala, BIB, a Barbados entity with extensive operations in Guatemala and assets in the United States, entered bankruptcy in Barbados. Acting for the custodian, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Sequor Law filed the first Chapter 15 case in Florida and obtained recognition of the Barbados liquidation as the main foreign proceeding. The matter has included extensive discovery in the United States and recoveries that include more than US$54 million from a REFCO bankruptcy claim and approximately US$1 million from a New York account.
Sequor Law represents the judicial administrator of Banco Santos, S.A. (in Liquidation). After an investigation revealed a theft of more than US$1 billion through a multi-country scheme, Sequor Law initiated a Chapter 15 proceeding. The corresponding recognition helped secure valuable evidence in the United States and elsewhere and supported the recovery of artwork valued in the millions, along with additional multi-million-dollar recoveries through a confidential ancillary settlement.
Sequor Law represents Petroforte Brasileiro de Petroleo Ltda. (“Petroforte”) (in Liquidation). After Petroforte entered insolvency proceedings in Brazil and the bankruptcy was extended to more than 300 entities and individuals, Sequor Law obtained deposition testimony and documentary evidence in the United States and pursued analogous proceedings in the Caribbean and Central America. The evidence supported the Judicial Administrator’s efforts in Brazil and may support additional recovery litigation, including through Chapter 15.
