Cynthia DeGabrielle
Senior Counsel
Cynthia brings a wealth of trial attorney experience to Irelan McDaniel. With 35 years of legal experience, including 23 years as an Assistant United States Attorney in Houston, Texas, Cynthia has prosecuted complex financial crimes, international money laundering, and public corruption, both foreign and domestic. Cynthia has tried more than 50 federal criminal cases to jury verdict, and served as U.S. Department of Justice Law Enforcement Policy Advisor to numerous foreign governments by providing technical legal assistance and guidance on justice policy and international best practices. Her experience at international law firms, and handling of numerous resolutions of civil trials, regulatory hearings, and advice to clients on compliance, risk analysis, and remediation makes her a valuable asset to any case anywhere.
Cynthia’s vast legal career includes general commercial litigation, including breach of contract and fraud, specialized energy litigation, including take-or-pay and product liability, and specialized insurance litigation, including bad faith claims against carriers.
Experience
Presentations
Publications
Experience
- Representing the CFO of a home health care agency accused of fraudulent billing and international money laundering.
- Represented a Vice President of a regional telecommunications company in an internal investigation into contracts fraudulently secured by a subordinate leading to money laundering and mail/wire fraud.
- Represented a physician accused of illegal importation of prescription drugs across a land border.
- Advised an oilfield services global sales manager on risks and penalties in an ongoing FCPA investigation.
- Board Member, Crime Stoppers of Houston.
- Criminal risk analysis and legal advice to parents charged with mail/wire fraud in a student’s college admission.
- Advised a foreign energy company under DOJ investigation for political corruption and international money laundering, on criminal exposure, defensive strategies, and response to investigative inquiries, including FBI interviews and MLATs.
- Conducted internal investigations for a global health services company into alleged bribery in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Europe, and negotiated with DOJ/SEC to resolve FCPA actions.
- Advised a global energy producer on the company’s and its executives’ criminal liability for the deaths of workers in a fragile governance zone caused by non-state actors.
- Successfully represented a medical clinic manager in a DOJ health care fraud criminal investigation.
- Successfully represented the CEO of a technology/software development firm in a federal mail/wire fraud and money laundering case.
- Conducted ongoing anti-corruption compliance risk assessments in China on behalf of a European multi-national company.
- Conducted anti-corruption due diligence investigations and compliance risk assessments of behalf of several U.S. companies for potential business partners in the deregulated Mexican energy sector.
- Conducted pre-acquisition due diligence and post-acquisition compliance program integration for many domestic and multi-national companies.
- Designed and implemented anti-corruption compliance programs for domestic energy companies entering foreign markets, including Canada and Mexico.
- Successfully represented an employee pool of a technology manufacturing start-up in a DOJ criminal investigation into dual-use technology export control violations.
- Conducted an FCPA risk assessment pursuant to an EPC contract for an energy production project to be executed in multiple high-risk African countries by a multinational power company.
- Conducted a global anti-corruption risk assessment for a multi-national pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturer, and implemented recommended compliance program improvements.
Presentations
- “How U.S. Laws Impact Financial Regulatory and Anti-Money Laundering Compliance in Mauritius”
- “Developments in U.S. Anti-Money Laundering Enforcement”
- “Criminal Risk Management for Chinese Businesses Under U.S. Law, Including Arrest and Extradition: the Huawei Case”
- “Due Diligence and the State of Enforcement: Identifying and Mitigating Risks”
- “Legal Risk Emergence for Businesses Operating in the US and China: the ZTE Matter”
- “China’s International Criminal Judicial Assistance Law: What Foreign Companies Need to Know”
- “Privileges for In-House Counsel in International Investigations”
- “Global Enforcement Trends: U.S. and South Africa”
- “United States Foreign Corrupt Practices Act Webinar for China”
- “Being Prepared for an Investigation in the African Banking Sector”
- “Money Laundering under South African and U.S. Laws”
- “U.S. Global Anti-Money Laundering Enforcement”
- “Compliance Responses to Global Enforcement Trends”
- “Developments in U.S. Anti-Money Laundering Enforcement”
- “Anti-Corruption, Compliance Programming and Africa”
- “U.S. Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Initiative”
- “FCPA in Africa and Case Studies; The Long Arm of the Law”
Publications
- US. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, “Anti-Corruption (Joint Ventures) Q and A: United States,” Practical Law, Thomson Reuters, 2017, 2019
- Co-author, “Potential disaster relief fraud cases loom in Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria’s wake,” Dentons Client Alert, September 25, 2017
- Contributing author, Federal Grand Jury Practice, United States Department of Justice, Office of Legal Education, October 2008
- Contributing author, Federal Narcotics Prosecutions, United States Department of Justice, Office of Legal Education, February 1999 and March 2004
- Author, International Efforts to Combat Money Laundering, Croatian Annual of Criminal Law and Practice, December 2001 (and other publications, including translations into English and French)
- Author, “The Federal Grand Jury,” Docket Call magazine, May 1999
- Contributing author, Federal Practice & Procedure, a Manual for Federal Prosecutors, United States Department of Justice, Office of Legal Education, 1997
- Author, “Settling Natural Gas Contract Disputes: The Pipeline Perspective,” 3 Natural Resources & Environment 7 (Winter 1989), Section of Natural Resources Law, American Bar Association
- Author, “Will Delay Rentals Excuse Failure to Protect Against Drainage: Author, “Rogers v. Heston Oil Co.,” 20 Tulsa L.J. 456, 1985
- Author, “Amarex, Inc. v. Baker: Skidding the Rig and Continuous Operations,”55 Okla. B.J. 1085, May 26, 1984
- State Bar of Texas
- US. District Courts for the Southern District of Texas
- Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals
University of Tulsa College of Law, Tulsa, Oklahoma
Juris Doctor
- Top 5%
- Editor-in-Chief (Student), Natural Resources Law -The Year in Review, American Bar Association
- Tulsa Law Journal, Staff Member
- H. Rosenstein Scholar
University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma
B.B.A. in Finance, With Distinction
- Top 5%
- Outstanding Senior Woman in the School of Business; Top Ten Senior Women
- William E. Schaper Scholar
- President, Sigma Sigma Sigma Sorority
- University of Richmond, London UK, Summer 1980
Instructor for the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Legal Education on many topics, including:
- Trial advocacy (basic and advanced),
- Grand jury secrecy
- Closing argument
- Evidence in white collar cases
- Immunity and the Fifth Amendment
- Trial preparation and case management in complex cases
- Effective writing for advocates
- Recent Supreme Court developments
- Money laundering,
- Criminal discovery
- Designed and implemented a comprehensive year-long training program on federal criminal law and discovery for paralegals and legal secretaries in the Southern District of Texas.
