DoJ Whistleblower Incentive Walks a Tightrope

Litigation attorney Michael Hantman was quoted in an article published by Commercial Dispute Resolution providing a perspective on the U.S. Department of Justice's (DoJ) new whistleblowing incentives. Mr. Hantman said he appreciates the shift from a disjointed approach to a unified system targeting a wide range of misconduct and sees the initiative as improving the likelihood that companies will enhance their compliance and training programs to avoid penalties. He stressed that the new incentives create significant motives for individuals to report wrongdoing, potentially leading to more timely and effective enforcement by the government.

"Something that clients often grapple with when deciding whether or not to self-disclose misconduct is, what are the chances the DoJ is going to find out? I think that's axiomatic. This will increase the odds that the government's going to find out about bad things, because now there's going to be significant incentives for folks to come out of the woodwork," he said.

"Companies that are smart are certainly going to say, 'we better really enhance our compliance program and ensure our training program is robust, because if it's not, we're not going to get away with it,'" he added.

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