Steven Dettelbach is a seasoned litigator and counselor who serves as co-leader of BakerHostetler’s national White Collar Defense and Corporate Investigations team. He returned to the firm in 2016, after spending almost seven years as the presidentially appointed United States Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio. As U.S. Attorney, Mr. Dettelbach ran high-profile investigations and both supervised and personally handled large scale, crisis-level litigations, many of which involved intense public and media scrutiny. He also supervised a broad docket of complex, civil matters, representing both defendants and plaintiffs. He has worked closely with and led selection processes for independent monitors when required.
Steve brings a depth of experience in managing crisis level commercial, regulatory and criminal matters, as well as in advising clients on how to structure compliance programs so as to help avoid such problems. He has served in senior policy roles at the Department of Justice, having been appointed by two Attorneys General to the prestigious Attorney General’s Advisory Committee, where he worked closely with other senior leaders at the Department. Prior to his appointment, Steve served for almost two decades as a federal prosecutor at Main Justice and in three different United States Attorneys’ Offices, as counsel in the United States Senate and as a litigator in private practice. He has represented companies and individuals in high stakes criminal, civil, internal and Congressional investigations. He has tried more than 30 cases to verdict and been involved in criminal matters in more than 20 states and the District of Columbia. Steve has never lost a federal criminal trial.
In his 25-year career, Steve has been involved in nearly every type of criminal, civil or regulatory investigation, in many circumstances with experience serving as counsel on different sides. He has also served as counsel on both sides of Congressional hearings and investigations. Representative matters and areas of experience include:
Healthcare
- Personally supervised multiple civil and criminal investigations of a large pharmaceutical distribution company involving violations of the False Claims Act and the Controlled Substances Act, resulting in fines totaling more than $150 million.
- Counseled an Internet-based healthcare provider in its efforts to ensure compliance with multiple state and federal Anti-Kickback and inducement statutory and regulatory schemes.
Corruption and Compliance
- Personally handled one of the largest ranging municipal corruption prosecutions in United States history, resulting in three trials and the conviction of officials and business people in four major cities.
- Organized a coalition of more than 100 leading local businesses in Cleveland to improve their compliance and anti-corruption protections.
FCPA
- Represented a senior energy executive in an FCPA and antitrust investigation in which the executive was identified as a target but in which no charges were ever brought.
- Supervised a major FCPA investigation in which the target company negotiated a Deferred Prosecution Agreement and paid a fine in the tens of millions of dollars. Led selection of independent monitor for the company.
Cyber Security
- Oversaw the prosecution of a “hacktivist” for breaching the network of a nationally prominent cable news host.
- Led the effort to form a regional, cyber security, information sharing consortium involving many of the largest corporate entities and universities in Northern Ohio, the Federal Reserve Bank, the FBI, the United States Secret Service and the United States Attorney’s Office, and hosted a kick-off cyber security summit featuring the Director of the FBI.
Financial Services
- Oversaw the investigation and personally tried a case involving the largest credit union failure in United States history. The investigation resulted in convictions for over twenty business people, bank officials and organized crime figures for bank bribery, fraud and obstruction of justice.
- Oversaw a civil False Claims Act enforcement action involving a large bank for their actions leading up to the mortgage meltdown, resulting in a $200 million fine.
Congressional Matters
- Represented a senior House staff member in an investigation by the House Committee on Official Standards (Ethics).
- Served as Counsel on the United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, including oversight hearings in Enron scandals, after which he helped to draft and negotiate many of the key enforcement provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.