Facing an investigation or charges in a foreign country is disorienting in a way a domestic case is not. The procedure is unfamiliar, the timetable is not yours, and the rights you assume you have may not exist.
We represent United States citizens and companies facing criminal exposure abroad, and foreign nationals facing prosecution in the United States. We work with local counsel in the relevant jurisdiction rather than pretending to replace them, and we coordinate the two proceedings so that a decision made in one does not quietly destroy the position in the other.
What we handle
- United States citizens charged, detained, or under investigation in a foreign country
- Foreign nationals facing federal or state prosecution in the United States
- Extradition — contesting requests into and out of the United States, and the provisional arrest that often precedes them
- Cross-border investigations involving mutual legal assistance treaty requests and foreign evidence-gathering
- Foreign Corrupt Practices Act investigations and prosecutions, and parallel foreign anti-bribery proceedings
- International money laundering and asset forfeiture
- Economic sanctions and export-control matters
- INTERPOL notices and diffusions
- Post-conviction relief and transfer applications for United States nationals imprisoned abroad
Why coordination is the whole job
In a cross-border matter the most dangerous mistake is usually made in good faith: a statement given to satisfy an investigator in one country becomes the evidence that supports a charge in the other. Documents produced to a foreign regulator arrive at a United States prosecutor months later. A plea entered abroad forecloses an argument at home.
Managing that means deciding, early and deliberately, what is said, to whom, in which order, and in which forum — and it means having a lawyer whose job is the whole picture rather than one jurisdiction’s piece of it.