Workforce Bulletin

In its May 28th, 2015 decision in Rhinehimer v. U.S. Bancorp Investments, Inc. (pdf), the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that an employee who reports alleged unlawful conduct has engaged in protected activity for the purposes of a retaliation claim under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (“SOX”), 18 U.S.C. § 1514A, as long as he or she has an objectively reasonable belief that the activity reported is prohibited under SOX.  The Sixth Circuit has joined the Second and Third Circuit Courts of Appeal in rejecting the previously adopted standard that an employee’s conduct must ...

By John F. Fullerton III

At the Firm’s 32^nd Annual Client Briefing held yesterday, I spoke on the financial services industry panel about the Dodd-Frank bounty program and the whistleblower anti-retaliation provisions of both the Dodd-Frank and Sarbanes-Oxley Acts.  Here are a few takeaways from that session:

• There have been at least three reported awards from the SEC to anonymous tipsters under the Dodd-Frank bounty program, the most recent of which, earlier this month, was an award of $14 million to a whistleblower whose information led to the recovery of “substantial ...