Zoë Newman is a Managing Director in the Business Intelligence and Investigations practice of Kroll, a division of Duff & Phelps, and co-heads the Financial Investigations team across the EMEA region. She has extensive experience in leading complex, cross-border forensic investigations into matters of fraud, corruption and potential regulatory breaches, including those relating to the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and UK Bribery Act. She also advises clients on how to best implement controls to mitigate these risks.
Since joining Kroll in 2000, Zoë has developed particular expertise in advising governments and corporates in emerging and frontier markets in the investigation of corruption and related asset recovery. This has expanded to include the detection of financial crime and fraud risk within the banking sector on behalf of central banks and other supervisory functions in such markets.
Zoë's broad range of investigative expertise spans forensic accounting, data analysis and asset tracing across complex corporate structures and multiple jurisdictions. She has spent significant periods of time working across Eastern Europe and the CIS, as well as in the Middle East.
Zoë earned a BSc in Economics and Law at Brunel University. She is a Fellow of the Association of Certified Chartered Accountants.
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
Banking Investigations: Asset Tracing and Recovery
- Engaged by the National Bank of Moldova to investigate the circumstances of the collapse of three banks in the jurisdiction with losses of US$1 billion. The investigation has focused on building a forensic case to demonstrate wrongdoing and an associated asset recovery strategy.
- Engaged by an Eastern European central bank to provide expert assistance in assessing the integrity of a multibillion-dollar nonperforming loans (NPL) portfolio.
- Acted on behalf of an Irish financial institution in tracing the proceeds of a multimillion-euro loan exposure across Eastern Europe and the Middle East.
- Bribery and Corruption
- Led a financial investigation on behalf of a major multinational corporation and its legal advisors into potential regulatory breaches made by senior management of subsidiaries in multiple locations across Eastern Europe. The investigation comprised a forensic review of books and records to provide evidence of potentially corrupt payments covering a seven-year period as well as the co-ordination and collection of electronic evidence in multiple languages from five jurisdictions for review by the client's legal counsel and Kroll. Investigative research was also required to assist in identifying potentially corrupt third parties. Kroll's findings were presented to counsel and utilised in regulatory disclosures.
- Engaged by external counsel of a U.S. multinational to provide forensic accounting support in an FCPA investigation of potentially corrupt payments made by subsidiaries in Southern Europe and Angola. Kroll presented its findings with counsel to the U.S. Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission.
- Led an investigation on behalf of a Saudi conglomerate into potentially corrupt payments made to third parties in relation to a multimillion-dollar infrastructure project.
- Engaged by the board of directors of a regional African financial institution to investigate the integrity of legacy transactions approved by the former board. The investigation involved a forensic reconstruction of acquisitions and associated third-party payments to assess for bribery and corruption risk, or other financial malfeasance.
- Government Corruption
- Acted on behalf of various sovereign funds, analyzing the integrity of investment decisions made by senior officials for evidence of kickbacks and/or bribery and corruption.
- Led an investigation on behalf of an Eastern European government into the integrity of transactions relating to major procurement initiatives made by ministries and other state departments. The investigation identified evidence of misapplication of state funds and corruption in the procurement process running to tens of millions of dollars. Kroll's findings were provided to counsel and used to file actions for recoveries in the United States and the United Kingdom.
- Money Laundering
- Acted on behalf of the legal advisors of various high-net-worth (HNW) individuals facing allegations of money laundering by regulators, providing expert evidence by forensically tracing origins of wealth and various significant deposits frozen in accounts.
- Advised national banks and other regulators in emerging and frontier markets as to the prevention and detection of money laundering within the banking system.
- Asset Searching
- Acted on behalf of various financial institutions in assessing NPL portfolio exposures for recovery potential. Conducted several associated multijurisdictional asset searches into HNW borrowers and ultimate beneficiaries to identify assets for recovery and negotiations.
- Provided various asset search expertise to lawyers on behalf of their clients seeking to identify and recover assets in consideration of or subsequent to obtaining a high-value litigation or arbitration award.