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Subcommittee on the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002

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Subcommittee on the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 AMERICAN BAR ASSOCIATI0ON SECTION OF LABOR AND EMPLOYMENT LAW COMMITTEE ON FEDERAL LABOR STANDARDS LEGISLATION 2005 MIDWINTER MEETING REPORT Submitted by: SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE SARBANES-OXLEY ACT OF 2002 David M. Safon, Chair Ford & HarrisonLLP 100 Park Avenue, Suite 2500 New York, NY 10017 Contributors: Jay P. Lechner Jason M. Zuckerman TABLE OF CONTENTS I. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................ 1 II. OVERVIEW OF SOX’S CIVIL WHISTLEBLOWER PROVISION ............ 2 III. COVERED EMPLOYERS .................................................................................. 3 A. Companies ................................................................................................. 3 B. Subsidiaries ................................................................................................ 6 C. Individual Liability ................................................................................... 8 D. Former Employees, Applicants & Third Parties ................................... 9 E. Criminal Provision .................................................................................... 9 IV. PROTECTED CONDUCT ................................................................................... 10 A. 18 U.S.C. § 1514A(a)(1) .......................................................................... 10 1. “Reasonable Belief” ........................................................................ 10 2. Complaint to a Member of Congress .............................................. 17 3. “Information” .................................................................................. 17 4. “Authority to Investigate, Discover, or Terminate Misconduct” .... 17 B. 18 U.S.C. § 1514A(a)(2) .......................................................................... 18 V. VIOLATIVE CONDUCT - RETALIATION ................................................... 19 A. Statutory Language ................................................................................ 19 B. Proof Issues .............................................................................................. 19 1. Prior knowledge, particularly by the decisionmaker, of plaintiff’s protected conduct. ........................................................................... 19 2. Causal nexus. .................................................................................. 20 3. Performance problems. ................................................................... 22 4. Previously planned decisions. ......................................................... 22 VI. PROCEDURES ................................................................................................... 23 A. Procedures and Burden of Proof ........................................................... 23 1. Filing of Complaint ......................................................................... 23 2. Preliminary Prima Facie Showing .................................................. 27 3. Notice Of Receipt ........................................................................... 28 i 4. Notice to SEC ................................................................................. 29 5. Respondent’s Statement of Position ............................................... 29 6. Investigation and Determinations ................................................... 30 7. Objections ....................................................................................... 31 8. Discovery and Hearing Before DOL ALJ ...................................... 32 9. Appeal to Administrative Review Board ........................................ 38 10. Appeal to Court of Appeals ............................................................ 41 11. Removal to Federal Court on or after 180 Days ............................. 41 12. Burdens of Proof ............................................................................. 43 13. Confidentiality ................................................................................ 45 B. Retroactivity ............................................................................................ 46 C. ADR .......................................................................................................... 46 D. Settlement Agreements ........................................................................... 47 VII. REMEDIES ......................................................................................................... 49 A. Civil .......................................................................................................... 49 1. Equitable Relief .............................................................................. 49 2. Attorneys’ Fees ............................................................................... 49 B. Criminal ................................................................................................... 50 VIII. ATTORNEY OBLIGATIONS/ETHICAL ISSUES ........................................ 50 A. SEC Rulemaking ..................................................................................... 50 B. Ethical Obligations, Outside and In-House Counsel ........................... 52 ii I. INTRODUCTION On July 30, 2002, President Bush signed into law the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (“SOX” or “the Act”), Pub. L. 107-204, 116 Stat. 802. Enacted in the wake of the Enron and WorldCom scandals, the Act was designed to restore investor confidence in the nation’s financial markets by improving corporate responsibility through required changes in corporate governance and accounting practices and by providing whistleblower protection to employees of publicly traded companies who report corporate fraud. SOX contains both a civil and a criminal whistleblower provision. Section 806, codified at 18 U.S.C. § 1514A, is in Title VIII of SOX, entitled the Corporate and Criminal Fraud Accountability Act of 2002. Section 806 creates a civil cause of action for employees who have been subject to retaliation for lawful whistleblowing. Senator Leahy, one of the authors of the Section, stated, “U.S. laws need to encourage and protect those who report fraudulent activity that can damage innocent investors in publicly traded companies.” See 148 Cong. Rec. S7420 (daily ed. July 26, 2002) (statement of Senator Leahy). The provision addressed Congress’s concern that corporate whistleblowers had hitherto been subject to the “patchwork and vagaries” of state laws, with a whistleblowing employee in one state being more vulnerable to retaliation than a similar whistleblowing employee in another state. Id. Section 806 is intended to set a national floor for employee protections and not to supplant or replace state law. Id. Enforcement of SOX’s civil whistleblower protection provision is entrusted, in the first instance, to the Secretary of Labor. The statute provides, however, that if the Secretary has not issued a final decision within 180 days of the filing of a complaint, and there has been no showing that the delay was due to the bad faith of the claimant, the claimant may bring a de novo action in district court. The United States Courts of Appeals have jurisdiction to review the Secretary of Labor’s final decisions. See 18 U.S.C. § 1514A(b)(2). Section 1107, SOX’s criminal whistleblower provision, is in Title XI of the Act, entitled the Corporate Fraud Accountability Act of 2002. Section 1107 makes it a felony for anyone to knowingly retaliate against or take any action “harmful” to any person, including interfering with his employment, for providing truthful information to a law enforcement officer relating to the commission or possible commission of a federal offense. See 18 U.S.C. § 1513(e). As part of a criminal obstruction of justice statute, Section 1107 is enforced by the U.S. Department of Justice. In addition to these civil and criminal whistleblower provisions, SOX contains two other mechanisms to encourage the disclosure of corporate fraud. Section 301 of the Act, codified at 15 U.S.C. § 78f(m)(4), requires that the audit committees of publicly traded companies establish procedures for the receipt, handling, and retention of anonymous complaints from employees relating to accounting or auditing matters. Section 307, which is codified at 18 U.S.C. § 7245, is another provision designed to encourage the reliability of corporate disclosures. Section 307 requires the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) to issue a rule setting forth ethical standards for attorneys who practice before it that in turn requires them to report to their corporate clients certain breaches of fiduciary duty. Pursuant to this statutory provision, the SEC issued a rule requiring attorneys “appearing and practicing before the Commission” to report “evidence of a material violation” to their client’s chief legal officer or chief executive officer and, absent an “appropriate response,” to the company’s audit committee or board of directors. See generally 17 CFR Part 205 (2003). II. OVERVIEW OF SOX’S CIVIL WHISTLEBLOWER PROVISION Under Section 806, publicly traded companies may not “discharge, demote, suspend, threaten, harass or in any other manner discriminate against an employee in the terms and conditions of employment” because of any protected whistleblowing activity. 18 U.S.C. § 1514A(a). The Section applies to companies with a class of securities registered under section 12 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (15 U.S.C. § 78l) or that are required to file reports under Section 15(d) of the
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