Biglaw

Ex-Attorney At Top 10 Biglaw Firm Receives Short Prison Sentence For Insider Trading

Prosecutors called the lawyer’s conduct ‘egregious.’

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Trading on insider information never, ever ends well for anyone — especially if you’re an attorney at a Biglaw firm.

Romero Cabral Da Costa Neto, 33, of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, started working as a visiting attorney at Gibson Dunn in September 2022. Back in August, Costa was arrested and charged with insider trading, accused of accessing confidential client information from within Gibson Dunn’s internal filing system to make trades ahead of a major pharmaceutical M&A deal.

In early November, Costa pleaded guilty to the charges, and earlier this week, he was sentenced. Costa asked for time already served plus supervised release, but instead, he was received two months in prison. The American Lawyer has the details:

The sentence is less than the eight months federal prosecutors had sought for Costa, which they noted was on the low end of the total offense level, in a sentencing memorandum filed Dec. 16.

Prosecutors argued that Costa’s ”personal characteristics, education, employment, and family wealth, make his conduct even more egregious” and that an incarceration sentence “deters the general public from committing these crimes as well,” in the memorandum.

According to prosecutors, among other illegal trades, Costa traded on information related to biopharmaceutical company Swedish Orphan Biovitrum AB’s acquisition of CTI BioPharma Corp (CTIC), a Gibson Dunn client. He bought more than 10,000 CTIC shares the day prior to the deal being announced publicly, and sold them the day after, making more than $42,000 in profits.

On top of being sentenced to spend time behind bars, Costa was ordered to forfeit the profits he made, as well as pay a $100 fine. He also came to an agreement with the SEC in a related civil enforcement action.

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Ex-Visiting Attorney at Gibson Dunn Sentenced to 2 Months in Prison for Insider Trading [American Lawyer]

Earlier: Ex-Attorney At Top 10 Biglaw Firm Pleads Guilty To Insider Trading
Ex-Attorney At Top 10 Biglaw Firm Charged With Insider Trading

Staci ZaretskyStaci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter and Threads or connect with her on LinkedIn.

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