White collar crime is an act of theft or other criminal conduct which violates a corporate or government officer’s fiduciary duties. Thus, if a person is acting in a position of financial trust or management for a client, a business, or a government agency, and they do something illegal, stealing the company’s funds, for example, then that person has committed a white collar crime. Thus the key element in the definition of white collar crime is that a person has been placed in a position of trust and that they have used that position to unjustly enrich themselves at the expense of the organization or client for whom they work.

These cases are being taken extremely seriously by the government these days, and the penalties can be severe, including years of imprisonment and huge fines. At the same time, these cases can be highly problematic for prosecutors to prosecute, because of their complexity. In order to win at trial, the prosecutor has to prove that the person actually intended to commit a criminal act. This is many times difficult to prove; because the prosecutor has to prove the person’s state of mind, and, at the same time, present complex financial information to a jury who has to actually understand what the prosecutor is trying to prove. Thus, white collar cases offer criminal defense lawyers a variety of ways to defend their clients against such charges.

Fortunately, many times these cases can be dealt with through negotiations with the police and federal agents and the prosecutors involved in the investigation – usually the local district attorney’s office in Los Angeles, Orange County, Riverside, Ventura, Los Angeles Counties or the US Attorney’s Office. The goal is to get the case dismissed before the client is ever arrested. This is extremely critical as the client’s entire career as a corporate or government officer may be on the line.

Mr. Sands handles a wide range of White Collar criminal charges involving the following:

• Accounting Fraud
• Antitrust Violations
• Bank Fraud
• Bankruptcy Fraud
• Computer Fraud
• Conspiracy
• Corporate Fraud
• Embezzlement charges
• Mail Fraud
• Money Laundering
• Multi-level Marketing Fraud
• RICO Violations
• Public Deception
• Securities Fraud
• Tax Fraud
• Tax evasion
• Wire Fraud