Month: September 2024

Source: United States Department of Justice Criminal Division

Deputy Attorney General (AG) Lisa Monaco traveled to San Francisco this week to participate in the 2024 RSA Cybersecurity Conference and underscore the Justice Department’s efforts to combat cybercrime and other persistent and emerging threats to national security, including the abuse of disruptive technologies, particularly AI.

In a keynote conversation at RSA on “Artificial Intelligence: The Ultimate Double-Edged Sword,” the Deputy AG highlighted how the Justice Department is developing guardrails to harness the benefits of AI to fulfill the Department’s mission, while mitigating the risks posed by misuse. She spoke to AI’s potential to help identify, disrupt, and deter criminals, terrorists, and hostile nation-states — and shared how the Department is using AI tools to speed up response times to a variety of threats. She stressed that existing laws offer a firm foundation to confront misuse of AI, even as the legal framework around AI evolves. Deputy AG Monaco warned of AI’s potential to supercharge existing threats to election security — in a year when over half the global population will vote — and she urged vigilance in the face of AI’s potential to accelerate online hate and disinformation, imitate trusted sources of information, and proliferate deepfakes.

The Deputy AG was interviewed by former FBI Deputy Director Sean Joyce at the 14th Annual Executive Dinner at RSA, where she discussed the progress of the Department’s Justice AI Initiative. Launched by the Deputy AG in February at the University of Oxford, Justice AI brings together stakeholders across industry, academia, law enforcement, and civil society to share expertise on both the promise of AI and the perils of its misuse.

At the RSA CEO Roundtable, she joined other senior government officials and leaders across the cybersecurity industry to discuss combating cyber threats, including the importance of public-private collaboration to the Department’s cyber strategy of protecting victims and prioritizing disruptions. Strong public-private partnerships have accelerated both the speed and scale of the Justice Department’s disruptive operations and have proven critical to dismantling nation-state-controlled botnets, taking down darknet marketplaces, and disrupting major ransomware gangs — such as the LockBit group, whose creator and administrator the Deputy AG announced was charged in the latest phase of a targeted international law enforcement operation.

The Deputy AG also led a roundtable convening, hosted by the Aspen Institute, with technology, financial, and venture capital executives to discuss the collective risks posed by the theft and abuse of disruptive technologies, especially AI, in a heightened geopolitical risk environment. She emphasized the work of the Justice Department’s Disruptive Technology Strike Force, a multi-agency effort to stop adversaries from siphoning our most critical technologies and innovations.

While in California, the Deputy AG visited the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of California in Sacramento. In meetings with U.S. Attorney Phillip A. Talbert, his leadership team, and the prosecutors and professional staff of the office, she thanked them for their hard work and dedication to the Department’s mission. Deputy AG Monaco also sat down with local, state, and federal law enforcement partners to discuss their collaboration to tackle violent crime and other public safety challenges.

Source: United States Department of Justice Criminal Division

An indictment was unsealed today charging a former correctional officer at the Federal Correctional Institution (FCI) Tallahassee with sexual acts with an inmate in federal custody.

The indictment alleges that, between June 2023, and August 2023, Kerontrez Lamar Kenon, 22, of Midway, Florida, engaged in sexual acts with an inmate while employed as a correctional officer for the Federal Bureau of Prisons (FBOP).

“As alleged in the indictment, defendant Kenon exploited his authority as a correctional officer to sexually abuse an adult in custody,” said Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco. “As this charge reflects, the Justice Department will hold accountable officials who abuse their authority over those they are sworn to protect. ”

“The sexual abuse of inmates by federal correctional officers is intolerable,” said U.S. Attorney Jason R. Coody for the Northern District of Florida. “This office will vigorously investigate and prosecute any officer who engages in such acts of abuse to the fullest extent of the law.”

“Today’s indictment demonstrates the Justice Department Office of the Inspector General’s ongoing commitment to aggressively investigate allegations of sexual abuse of inmates by Correctional Officers,” said Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz of the Justice Department.

If convicted, Kenon faces a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison.

The Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General and FBI investigated the case.

Assistant U.S. Attorneys Meredith Steer and James McCain for the Northern District of Florida are prosecuting the case.

FBOP is committed to rooting out misconduct within its ranks and working with law enforcement partners to prosecute violations of federal law. The numerous FBOP employees working diligently to ensure justice for the victims of misconduct are critical to the Department’s reform efforts.

Source: United States Department of Justice Criminal Division

The Justice Department announced today that it secured a settlement agreement with Second Nature, a non-profit organization based in Massachusetts. The agreement resolves the department’s determination that Second Nature violated the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) by posting discriminatory job advertisements that deterred non-U.S. citizens from applying for open positions. 

“When employers advertise jobs only to U.S. citizens, they discourage and block other eligible workers like lawful permanent residents from applying, and deny them a fair chance to be considered,” said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “The Civil Rights Division will not tolerate national origin or citizenship status discrimination and is committed to knocking down these unlawful discriminatory barriers.”

After opening an investigation based on a worker’s complaint, the Civil Rights Division’s Immigrant and Employee Rights Section (IER) concluded that Second Nature posted a job advertisement inviting applications only from U.S. citizens. In doing so, the company deterred non-U.S. citizens with permission to work (such as people granted asylum or refugee status, and lawful permanent residents) from applying to the job advertisements and being fairly considered for the employment opportunities. The investigation further determined that the lawful permanent resident who filed the complaint was deterred from applying for the job because of the discriminatory language in the posting. The INA’s anti-discrimination provision generally prohibits employers from discriminating in recruiting or refusing to hire workers based on their citizenship status or national origin.

Under the settlement, Second Nature will pay a civil penalty to the United States and pay the affected worker lost wages. The agreement also requires the company to train those employees who recruit on the INA’s requirements, revise its employment policies and be subject to departmental monitoring and reporting requirements. 

IER is responsible for enforcing the anti-discrimination provision of the INA. Among other things, the statute prohibits discrimination based on citizenship status and national origin in hiring, firing or recruitment or referral for a fee; unfair documentary practices and retaliation and intimidation. 

Find more information on how employers can avoid discrimination in recruitment and hiring on IER’s website. Learn more about IER’s work and how to get assistance through this brief video. Find more information on how employers can avoid citizenship status discrimination on IER’s website. Applicants or employees who believe they were discriminated against based on their citizenship, immigration status or national origin in hiring, firing, recruitment or during the employment eligibility verification process (Form I-9 and E-Verify); or subjected to retaliation, may file a charge. The public can also call IER’s worker hotline at 1-800-255-7688 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired); call IER’s employer hotline at 1-800-255-8155 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired); email IER@usdoj.gov; sign up for a free webinar or visit IER’s English and Spanish websites. Subscribe for email updates from IER.

Source: United States Department of Justice Criminal Division

The Justice Department today announced the formation of the Antitrust Division’s Task Force on Health Care Monopolies and Collusion (HCMC). The HCMC will guide the division’s enforcement strategy and policy approach in health care, including by facilitating policy advocacy, investigations and, where warranted, civil and criminal enforcement in health care markets.

“Every year, Americans spend trillions of dollars on health care, money that is increasingly being gobbled up by a small number of payers, providers and dominant intermediaries that have consolidated their way to power in communities across the country,” said Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division. “Led by Katrina Rouse, the task force will identify and root out monopolies and collusive practices that increase costs, decrease quality and create single points of failure in the health care industry.”

The HCMC will consider widespread competition concerns shared by patients, health care professionals, businesses and entrepreneurs, including issues regarding payer-provider consolidation, serial acquisitions, labor and quality of care, medical billing, health care IT services, access to and misuse of health care data and more. The HCMC will bring together civil and criminal prosecutors, economists, health care industry experts, technologists, data scientists, investigators and policy advisors from across the division’s Civil, Criminal, Litigation and Policy Programs, and the Expert Analysis Group, to identify and address pressing antitrust problems in health care markets.

The HCMC will be directed by Katrina Rouse, a long-serving antitrust prosecutor who joined the Antitrust Division in 2011. She previously served as Chief of the division’s Defense, Industrials and Aerospace Section, Assistant Chief of the Division’s San Francisco Office, a Special Assistant U.S. Attorney and a Trial Attorney in the division’s Healthcare and Consumer Products Section. She holds degrees from Columbia University and Stanford Law School, and clerked for federal judges on the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Rouse will serve concurrently as the division’s Deputy Director of Civil Enforcement and Special Counsel for Health Care.

The Antitrust Division welcomes input and information from the public, including from practitioners, patients, researchers, business owners and others who have direct insight into competition concerns in the health care industry. Members of the public can share their experiences with the Task Force on Health Care Monopolies and Collusion by visiting HealthyCompetition.gov. Where appropriate, the division will refer matters to other federal and state law enforcers.

Source: United States Department of Justice Criminal Division

The Justice Department has secured an agreement with Cobb County, Georgia, resolving the United States’ claim that the County violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act (Title VII) by using credit checks and a written exam that discriminated against African American firefighter candidates based on race. Cobb County has stopped using the challenged hiring practices and will pay $750,000 in back pay to applicants disqualified by those practices. The County will also hire up to 16 of those applicants with retroactive seniority.

“This settlement should send a strong message to employers that reliance on a job applicant’s credit history may be discriminatory and unlawful,” said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “Consumer credit checks create a Catch-22 for people seeking access to job opportunities. Cobb County’s hiring practices created artificial barriers that prevented qualified Black job candidates from being considered for firefighter positions. Discriminatory barriers, like credit checks, not only cost candidates a fair chance at a job, they also prevent the public from being served by firefighters drawn from the most robust hiring pool possible.”

“Every person, regardless of race, deserves an equal opportunity to compete for jobs. Employers should identify and eliminate policies and procedures that create a discriminatory impact on applicants based on race,” said U.S. Attorney Ryan K. Buchanan for the Northern District of Georgia. “Our office will continue to devote resources to eliminate prejudicial policies that illegally deprive qualified candidates of a fair chance to compete for employment opportunities.”

The department’s lawsuit, filed in the Northern District of Georgia, alleges that Cobb County discriminated in its firefighter hiring process in two ways. First, by screening out candidates based on their credit histories. Many employers use credit checks when screening applicants based on a mistaken assumption that credit history is a measure of character or job fitness. As the department alleges, Cobb County could not establish a connection between credit history and job performance or character and thus did not have a lawful reason for using credit history as part of its hiring process. Second, Cobb County ranked candidates based on their performance on a written examination designed to determine placement level in college classes. The department alleges that these practices disproportionately removed African Americans from consideration for firefighter positions without providing any evidence that candidates who advanced based on these practices were more qualified to serve as firefighters. 

Title VII is a federal statute that prohibits employment discrimination based on race, sex, color, national origin, and religion. Title VII prohibits not only intentional discrimination but also prohibits employment practices that result in a disparate impact upon a protected group, unless such practices are job related and consistent with business necessity. 

The full and fair enforcement of Title VII is a top priority of the Civil Rights Division. More information about the Civil Rights Division can be found at www.justice.gov/crt and more information about the division’s Employment Litigation Section can be found at www.justice.gov/crt/employment-litigation-section.

Attorneys Brian McEntire and Juliet Gray of the Civil Rights Division’s Employment Litigation Section and Deputy Chief Aileen Bell Hughes for the Northern District of Georgia’s Public Integrity & Civil Rights Section are handling the matter.