White-Collar and Securities Criminal Defense

Joseph A. Bondy, PLLC represents clients in white collar criminal defense, securities fraud, SEC, FEC, PCAOB, crypto fraud, money laundering, wire fraud, bribery, and parallel civil and criminal proceedings.

New York White Collar and Securities Criminal Defense Lawyer

White collar criminal cases rarely begin with handcuffs.

They begin with questions. A subpoena. A call from an agent. A request for documents. A

Wells notice. An SEC inquiry. A board-level concern. A regulator asking for testimony. A

prosecutor circling a transaction, campaign contribution, investor disclosure, accounting

entry, crypto offering, or business relationship that once seemed ordinary and now looks

dangerous.

Joseph A. Bondy, PLLC represents individuals in white collar and securities-related

criminal matters, including securities fraud, wire fraud, money laundering, bribery, public

corruption, regulatory investigations, crypto-fraud matters, campaign-finance issues,

forfeiture, sentencing, appeals, and parallel civil and criminal proceedings.

For more than three decades, Joseph A. Bondy has defended clients in serious federal and state matters involving difficult facts, high public stakes, and substantial personal

exposure. His practice includes civil and criminal securities matters, SEC-related

proceedings, Federal Election Commission matters, Public Company Accounting

Oversight Board matters, federal trial work, sentencing advocacy, forfeiture, appeals, and

crisis representations.In white collar defense, the legal problem is almost never only legal. The client’s liberty, business, reputation, investors, employees, license, family, and future may all be moving at once.

That is the work.

White Collar Criminal Investigations

The early stage of a white-collar investigation is often the most consequential.

A client may not know whether the government views them as a witness, subject, target,

potential cooperator, or defendant. The facts may be scattered across emails, texts, bank

records, trading data, investor decks, accounting files, encrypted messages, board

materials, campaign records, or documents held by a company that has its own counsel

and its own interests.

Federal white-collar investigations may involve grand jury subpoenas, search warrants,

proffer requests, interviews, privilege issues, internal investigations, document

productions, preservation demands, and parallel agency proceedings. See Fed. R. Crim. P.

6, 16, 17, 41.

The Office represents clients at the investigative stage, where disciplined judgment can

shape the defense before the government’s theory hardens. Early decisions matter:

whether to speak, what to produce, how to preserve privilege, how to respond to

subpoenas, whether to engage with prosecutors or regulators, and how to avoid turning

uncertainty into unnecessary exposure.

A white-collar investigation rewards clarity. Panic is expensive. So is denial.

Securities Fraud Defense

Securities cases are built around story and materiality.

The government may focus on investor communications, offering materials, public

statements, private messages, trading history, valuation claims, revenue recognition, risk

disclosures, related-party transactions, accounting judgments, or alleged omissions.

Prosecutors and regulators may argue that a business failure was fraud, that optimism was deception, or that a disputed interpretation became criminal once investors lost money.Securities fraud allegations may arise under § 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, SEC Rule 10b-5, § 17(a) of the Securities Act of 1933, or the federal securities-fraud

statute, 18 U.S.C. § 1348. See 15 U.S.C. §§ 77q(a), 78j(b); 17 C.F.R. § 240.10b-5; 18 U.S.C. §

1348.

The defense must examine not only what was said, but what was known, when it was

known, who knew it, whether the statement was material, whether the alleged omission

made the statement misleading, whether there was criminal intent, and whether the

government is using hindsight to make a business judgment look fraudulent.

These cases often turn on documents. But documents do not try cases by themselves.

Context does.

Insider Trading and Market Conduct

Insider trading cases require careful attention to duty, knowledge, materiality, personal

benefit, trading history, communications, and the government’s theory of deception.

The Supreme Court has long recognized that insider trading liability depends on more than possession of market-sensitive information. The government must prove a legally

sufficient theory of fraud, breach, deception, or misappropriation. See Chiarella v. United

States, 445 U.S. 222 (1980); Dirks v. SEC, 463 U.S. 646 (1983); United States v. O’Hagan,

521 U.S. 642 (1997); Salman v. United States, 580 U.S. 39 (2016).

Market-conduct investigations may involve trading before announcements, short-selling

reports, analyst communications, expert-network contacts, research calls, social-media

statements, confidential business information, or transactions that appear suspicious

only after the government reconstructs them in hindsight.

The defense must resist that hindsight. Trading is not fraud because it was profitable. A

conversation is not criminal because it preceded a trade. And ambiguity is not intent

merely because prosecutors say it with confidence.

Wire Fraud, Money Laundering, and Business Crimes

Not every white-collar case is charged as a securities case.Federal prosecutors often charge business conduct through wire fraud, mail fraud, bank fraud, conspiracy, false statements, obstruction, money laundering, or forfeiture statutes. See 18 U.S.C. §§ 1001, 1341, 1343, 1344, 1349, 1503, 1512, 1519, 1956, 1957. 

Those statutes are broad. That is precisely why defense judgment matters.

A wire-fraud allegation may depend on whether the government can prove a scheme to

defraud, material misrepresentation, intent, and use of interstate wires. A money-

laundering allegation may turn on whether funds were proceeds of specified unlawful

activity, whether a transaction was designed to conceal, promote, or evade reporting, and

whether the alleged laundering is truly separate from the underlying offense. See 18 U.S.C. §§ 1343, 1956, 1957.

The Office represents clients in matters where prosecutors attempt to convert

complicated business activity into criminal intent. That requires factual command, legal

precision, and the discipline to separate bad optics from actual proof.

Bribery, Public Corruption, and Campaign-Finance Matters

White collar defense often sits at the intersection of business, politics, influence, access,

and money.

The Office represents clients in matters involving bribery, public corruption, campaign-

finance issues, regulatory exposure, and politically sensitive allegations. These cases may

involve federal bribery statutes, honest-services fraud, program bribery, false statements,

obstruction, or campaign-finance enforcement. See 18 U.S.C. §§ 201, 666, 1001, 1343,

1346; 52 U.S.C. § 30109.

The law in this area is technical and contested. The Supreme Court has repeatedly limited

efforts to treat ordinary political conduct, access, or generalized influence as federal

crime. See Skilling v. United States, 561 U.S. 358 (2010); McDonnell v. United States, 579

U.S. 550 (2016); Percoco v. United States, 598 U.S. 319 (2023).

The defense must identify the difference between politics and crime, influence and

agreement, access and bribery, mistake and intent, embarrassment and illegality.

That difference can decide the case. SEC, FEC, PCAOB, and Regulatory Proceedings

White collar matters often move on more than one track.

A client may face a criminal investigation while also responding to the Securities and

Exchange Commission, the Federal Election Commission, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, a self-regulatory organization, a licensing body, an employer, a board, investors, auditors, banks, or civil litigants.

The Department of Justice expressly recognizes coordination among criminal, civil,

regulatory, and administrative remedies. See U.S. Dep’t of Justice, Justice Manual § 1-

12.000. Parallel proceedings are not an abstraction. They are a common feature of serious

white-collar practice.

Regulatory proceedings may involve subpoenas, testimony, Wells submissions, document productions, settlement negotiations, injunctions, bars, penalties, disgorgement,disciplinary proceedings, or referrals to criminal authorities. See 15 U.S.C. § 78u; 15 U.S.C. § 7215; 52 U.S.C. § 30109.

The Office represents clients in SEC, FEC, PCAOB, and related civil, criminal, and

administrative matters. The goal is not merely to answer one agency. The goal is to protect the client across all fronts.

Crypto Fraud and Digital Asset Cases

Digital asset cases are new in form, but not in danger.

Crypto-fraud investigations may involve token offerings, alleged misstatements to

investors, celebrity or influencer promotions, exchange listings, wallet activity, offshore

entities, market manipulation allegations, money-transmission issues, forfeiture, and

disputes over whether a digital asset or transaction falls within existing securities law.

The government and regulators often apply old statutes to new technology. Token offerings may be analyzed under investment-contract principles. See SEC v. W.J. Howey Co., 328 U.S. 293 (1946). Criminal charges may be brought under securities fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy, money laundering, or forfeiture statutes. See 15 U.S.C. §§ 77q(a), 78j(b); 17

C.F.R. § 240.10b-5; 18 U.S.C. §§ 1343, 1348, 1349, 1956, 1957.

Joseph A. Bondy represented Raymond Trapani, a co-founder of CentraTech, in

cryptocurrency-fraud proceedings arising from allegations involving an initial coin offering. The Office understands that digital asset matters require both technical fluency and traditional trial judgment. A blockchain record may be permanent. The government’s interpretation of it is not.

Parallel Civil and Criminal Proceedings

Parallel proceedings can create strategic traps.

A client may be asked to give testimony in a civil or regulatory matter while a criminal

investigation is underway. Producing documents in one forum may affect another. A public statement may help with investors and hurt with prosecutors. A civil settlement may create admissions. Silence may protect one interest and damage another.

Courts have long recognized that civil and criminal proceedings may proceed at the same time, but the practical consequences for a defendant can be severe. See United States v. Kordel, 397 U.S. 1 (1970); SEC v. Dresser Indus., Inc., 628 F.2d 1368 (D.C. Cir. 1980) (en banc).

The Office helps clients navigate these overlapping pressures with care. The defense must be coordinated. It must account for the court, the agency, the prosecutor, the employer, the market, the press, and the client’s long-term future.

A white-collar defense strategy that wins one forum while damaging another is not

strategy. It is mess with letterhead.

Trial, Sentencing, and Forfeiture

White collar cases must be prepared for trial, even when trial never occurs.

The government’s proof may depend on cooperating witnesses, business records, expert

testimony, trading analysis, financial records, emails, texts, encrypted messages, investor

materials, or testimony from accountants, auditors, bankers, employees, or alleged

victims. The defense must be ready to challenge the government’s story at the level of

facts, law, motive, memory, documents, and common sense. Joseph A. Bondy has tried securities-fraud, money-laundering, bribery, RICO, narcotics-trafficking, murder, and other serious cases to verdict.

Sentencing also matters profoundly in white collar cases. The advisory Sentencing

Guidelines may be driven by alleged loss, gain, number of victims, sophisticated means,

role adjustments, obstruction allegations, restitution, forfeiture, and collateral

consequences. See U.S.S.G. § 2B1.1; 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a).

The Guidelines are advisory, not mandatory. See United States v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220

(2005); Gall v. United States, 552 U.S. 38 (2007). Sentencing courts must consider the

client as a whole person, not merely as an offense level. See Pepper v. United States, 562

U.S. 476 (2011).

The Office has substantial experience obtaining below-Guidelines outcomes over

government objection and approaches sentencing as a central stage of advocacy.

Forfeiture and restitution may also be central. The government may seek restrained funds, substitute assets, money judgments, proceeds, business interests, or property connected to alleged fraud or money laundering. See Fed. R. Crim. P. 32.2; 18 U.S.C. §§ 981, 982; 28 U.S.C. § 2461(c).

The money fight is often part of the liberty fight.

Reputation, Business, and Investor Consequences

A white-collar accusation can damage a person before any verdict.

Clients may face investor demands, board pressure, employment consequences, frozen

accounts, licensing problems, press attention, social-media distortion, bank de-risking,

civil litigation, divorce pressure, family disruption, and reputational harm that outpaces the legal process.

The Office represents clients in matters where criminal defense, regulatory exposure,

business consequences, and public scrutiny overlap. In those matters, discretion is not

cosmetic. It is strategy.

The goal is to protect the client in court while anticipating what the accusation may do

outside of it.Why Joseph A. Bondy, PLLC

Joseph A. Bondy is a New York City trial lawyer with more than thirty years of experience

representing clients in difficult criminal, securities, regulatory, forfeiture, sentencing,

appellate, and crisis matters.

His practice includes white collar criminal defense, civil and criminal securities matters,

SEC-related proceedings, FEC and PCAOB matters, crypto-fraud cases, federal sentencing advocacy, forfeiture, appeals, and representations involving public controversy and business risk.

The Office is frequently retained in matters where liberty, reputation, money, and

professional identity are all at stake.

Clients come to Joseph A. Bondy, PLLC when the matter is serious, the facts are

complicated, and the defense requires judgment, preparation, nerve, and restraint.

Contact the Office

If you are under investigation, have received a subpoena, are facing an SEC, FEC, PCAOB,

or criminal inquiry, or need representation in a white collar or securities-related matter,

contact Joseph A. Bondy, PLLC for a confidential consultation.