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If the Feds Want to Target You, They Can · TARGET Podcast

• speaker-0: When the FBI first showed up at my house, I could not sleep. I just couldn't. I was so terrified. speaker-1: If the feds want to target you, they can target you. And so the question isn't can you get protected from being subjected to this? It's the question of can you survive it if it happens. speaker-0: This is hell. We're at war. This is my whole life. speaker-1: I always tell clients, look, if you're not guilty, don't act guilty. Don't don't lie to federal authorities. speaker-0: First of all, don't talk to the speaker-1: Don't think that you're gonna outsmart some process. speaker-0: You will need everybody who loves you, and you will need them in ways you cannot fathom. speaker-1: I'm Alex Little, a former federal prosecutor who now is a defense lawyer that stands on the other side of the courtroom defending clients. speaker-0: And I'm Amy Nelson, a former Wall Street lawyer and entrepreneur who never touched criminal law until the FBI knocked on my door. And I had to walk my husband through a four-year DOJ investigation. speaker-1: This is the Target Podcast. Welcome everybody. we have a special episode of the podcast today. We've done six or seven of them now and folks have questions as one does about this topic. speaker-0: So many questions. speaker-1: And so we want to go over and answer some of those questions to the extent that we can. so Amy, do you wanna start? speaker-0: I think what I have heard the most on my Instagram and in real life is how do I protect myself from becoming a target? speaker-1: Yeah, what's funny, 'cause I I tell people on the civil side, nothing can stop people from suing you. Like if they want to sue you, they can sue you. If the feds want to target you, they can target you. And so the question isn't, can you get protected from being subjected to this? It's the question of can you survive it if it happens. speaker-0: Yeah, which is a deep question. speaker-1: Yeah, and I think the answer is you can. Yeah. and it really comes down to I think bizarrely, like some of these non specific things like attitude approach. I I think being afraid is a really dangerous thing. And so you need to t the best way to protect yourself is to be informed, don't give in to despair. and whatever sort of is happening. To feel like you have some sense of control. Because people think, gosh, this is going on, I have no control, all these things are happening to me. And in doing that, they let go of the choices that they can make to make a situation better. speaker-0: Yeah. And the specific advice I would give, to layer on to that is, a lot of people say when they get get into a situation like this, well, I'm not a lawyer, so there's nothing I can do. There are absolutely things you can do. Usually in a white collar investigation, you know, it is related to your area of expertise, to your industry. And you know more about that than your lawyer does, than the prosecutors do, than the FBI agents do. And so finding a way to convey that information, like doing the work, dig into the facts as you know them. Get all the records together. And listen, like even if you're not a lawyer in this modern world of the internet and AI, like you can do a lot of research and and educate yourself. Like don't get in your lawyer's way. speaker-1: Don't put it on AI because that's all discoverable. speaker-0: Yeah, but you can do research. you can do research on it. speaker-1: So let's say I I think that if you actually have specific steps, what you can do to protect yourself, one, you you do need a good lawyer. speaker-0: You do. And and not just like the first lawyer that your neighbor Bob recommends to you. So speaker-1: You need a good lawyer, which is the difference between you just need a lawyer. Because having a bad lawyer can make things ten times worse. speaker-0: Well let's talk about a good lawyer in the context of a criminal investigation because it's not the same as a good lawyer in any other context. speaker-1: Lawyer who understands what's going on. So somebody who has had experience generally in the sort of cases that you've had. People will be like, Hey, have you had experience representing former Olympians who have been investigated for fraudulent landscaping schemes in New Mexico? And you're like, No. No. But that's not the level of specificity or gener generality you need, right? You need a lawyer if it's if they're federal, you need somebody who's worked in the federal system. and if they've dealt with fraud, white collar crimes, who generally understand the crimes and who you think can understand the industry you're in. speaker-0: And the layer I would add to that is that something I didn't know, you know, almost ninety eight percent of Americans who are accused of a federal crime resolve those allegations by pleading guilty. So there are many federal criminal defense lawyers who've actually never gone to trial. Yeah. speaker-1: It's and it's like do you want a doctor who's never done a surgery to tell you how surgery's gonna go? speaker-0: No. And s a a lawyer who's willing to go to trial. I mean it's remarkable to me, but there are a lot of federal criminal defense attorneys who don't want to go Yeah, they don't want to go to trial. Because you it's you may not win. speaker-1: And they think, gosh, that's a huge indictment of me. Yeah. no, I that's right. So I think that the qu this first step of getting a good lawyer, you need to actually engage in the process, get recommendations, do your research. Don't take the first person. I tell people who call us, you know, call other people. Make sure you've got a personality fit because this is the person you're gonna be in the foxhole with and you're gonna be battling with. And if you don't trust them, if you don't have a good sort of vibe with them, it's it's much worse than it needs to be. Yeah. And then g ask other people for their reputation. Ask other people how they view that person. And you Google best lawyer for this, you're not gonna find anything. But if you talk to people and talk to people who are in the w the world, the industry, judges, for example, are great resources if you have a friend who's a judge. so get a good lawyer is I think one thing you need to protect yourself. speaker-0: I think too, and we should talk about money. speaker-1: Well, having money is important. It's help helpful. But I do think before resources, I would say people underestimate the value of their community and their support system. And so how do you protect yourself? Have friends, you know, have family who love you. speaker-0: Build relationships before you need them. speaker-1: I think, you know, I mean, obviously it's good to have relationships in life, but I think when cr any crisis happens, whether it's, you know, a health crisis, a a crisis in your community. crisis like an investigation, if you have a community who supports you and who you can rely upon, it doesn't matter how much money you have in your bank account. That is invaluable. speaker-0: And I and I think too, for a lot of people, certainly people like me, it's hard to lean on those people at first. It's hard. Yeah. Well, you're ashamed. And also, if you're a person who's used to just getting it done, whatever it is, you don't often just do it. Right. But in this situation, you will need everybody who loves you. And you will need them in ways you cannot fathom. And so you have to also be somebody who becomes willing to ask for help. speaker-1: Yeah. And and it and that requires you to relinquish a little bit of control. And to give up I mean, you have to give up this illusion that you're perfect, right? That you're this sort of I am not superhuman. and a lot of people, the c folks that we represent, have a hard time doing that because that's the image and sometimes the reality of what they've been living, right? Yeah. so that's sort of a a piece. I mean, ha the money and protecting your money, it I think it's important to have a sense and and we get this all the time with couples. Well one person will know a lot about their financial situation, the other one won't. Yeah. And then they get into crisis and they're having to figure out like that at the same time when they're trying to navigate this. It's terrible. Well I th you've got to be literate about your own financial situation. speaker-0: Always, just life advice. But the other thing, and the thing is too, I think you need to become as realistic as you can about your monetary situation when you are dealing with an investigation. Because there they can be years long. If you've listened to the podcast, like every single person we've talked to has has gone through a gauntlet that lasted two, three, five, ten years. Right. So you have to kind of figure out what your resources are where you can get more resources. Like, you know, I had to take jobs that I wouldn't have otherwise. speaker-1: Some people rely on GoFundMe's. There's no shame to that. speaker-0: I did we did that at one point. speaker-1: If you if you don't have the resources you think you need, figure out how to go get them. Yeah. Yeah. and if you if you have no resources and the federal public defenders are can be very good lawyers, make sure you get them early. Yeah. Right? Don't wait. speaker-0: They can be great lawyers. Yes. Don't wait. And also Carl and I sat down at one point and we made a list of everything we could sell. And we did in fact end up selling almost everything. But I mean that was we made a decision just to do that. But like you have to kind of list out the resources that you have. It's very tactical, but it's a necessary thing to do. speaker-1: I think you have a good example. one of your resources was your willingness to be public and be vulnerable. Yeah. and and people don't think about that as a resource, but it if you are willing to be vulnerable and to expose yourself to the public in this process, it it generally pays dividends. Yeah. It's not gonna pay dividends if you're like, look at me, I am just g how how unfair is this? Yeah. It it has to be with with some sort of reasonable sense of like I recognize that this thing I'm going through is tough and I'm I'm hope I'm looking for people to help me. and I recognize to if the extent you're responsible for part of it, own the part you're responsible for. speaker-0: I mean people I think like no one expects anyone else in this world to be perfect. And there's certainly no perfect victim and there's no perfect criminal, you know, all of these different things. But if you can but I think what people do appreciate in this world where anybody can get on stage is someone who is willing to be their authentic self. Yep. And so sharing your story is power. speaker-1: Now that that's not me advising folks to go out there and and talk about their case. But there's but there's a difference between the case and the investigation, the case and the process, right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean number one, don't I think maybe the first advice before we do if get a good lawyer is don't make the situation worse. Don't don't lie to federal authorities. Well, but like don't your speaker-0: Don't talk speaker-1: whole right, don't talk to them at all. But certainly don't lie to them. Don't talk to them, but don't lie. Don't think that you're gonna outsmart some process. don't destroy evidence, don't go delete emails. I mean, the the most guilty looking thing, even if you're innocent, is going in and deleting. speaker-0: A hundred percent. Don't do it. And back to the point of don't talk to federal authorities. I cannot tell you how many very smart friends of mine will talk to law enforcement because they think if I don't talk to them, I look guilty. Yeah. No. First of all, it doesn't matter how you look. It just doesn't matter how you look. What matters is the fact that you get legal representation before you talk to federal authorities because they aren't your friends. speaker-1: No, and so maybe what number one is don't make the situation worse. Number two is get a good lawyer. Yeah. Number three is make sure you've got a community to rely upon and then rely upon that community or that spouse or that family. and then figure out what your resources are, whether it's monetary or otherwise. I see that's that's what you can do. speaker-0: Yeah, I think I think one other thing to also think about that I didn't know when my husband got a target letter, you it feels like everything is an urgent crisis because you are in crisis and you're like, Okay, the train the train is moving, I have gotta figure this out in one second. Right. You probably have more than one second. speaker-1: You definitely have more than one second. speaker-0: So you need to take a beat. You don't have to hire a lawyer within the first hour. You don't have to alert everyone in the world as to what's going on within the first day. Like you can pause and figure it out. speaker-1: This is a deep cut from Jack Bauer twenty years ago on the show twenty four. If Jack Bauer can kill twenty seven people in twenty four hours and never go to the bathroom and save the world, you have s more time than you think. speaker-0: Yeah, I could probably do that too, but speaker-1: It's not let's not wish it upon anybody. speaker-0: But I also like i I wonder about your your take on this. So we talk about not deleting things, don't make things worse. looking back over my family's experience, I am deeply glad that we had so many records and had so many emails and had so many of the receipts per se. And so kind of I think that business owners, people should keep records. speaker-1: Yeah, look, i if you're innocent having records is great. If you're n not innocent, having records is bad. If you speaker-0: Right. speaker-1: Yeah. And so I think but the but the the way I would think about it is if this were to be if somebody were to contest this thing or were to to create some narrative that isn't true, I'd want to document if I had one to show otherwise. Right. And so I I do think, you know, purging your stuff on a regular basis probably isn't a great idea. because If we can tell the story through documents and not through just your say so, yeah. That's so much but we go back to Ryan Bloom, who we had on this episode. Right. Ryan had these just binders of every single thing. And the first time he came into the office and we used a lot of that material and talking to the prosecutors and getting them to drop the case, it was incredibly useful. Yeah. and so his sort of resource was I've got time and know how and I'm gonna go put this together. speaker-0: Yeah. And one resource you probably do have, we talk about time and the negative a lot when we're talking about criminal investigations. And I know having survived when it's a family member, the time can be the most painful thing because you just want it to be over. But time can be your friend. speaker-1: If got the time and you can spend it building your defense and to show, hey, we didn't do this or this is not a crime, that's super important. Yeah. speaker-0: And my husband says that time kills all deals. And so if you if you take your time with the investigation, it'll probably kill it. speaker-1: It might kill the yeah. If you longer you wait, they may not be there to charge you at the end. speaker-0: Yeah, I think that's right. speaker-1: All right, so that was the first question we've been getting is how do you protect yourself? Okay. th I guess another question, this is directed at you, when you find yourself subjected to this, what is the number one piece of advice you would give folks who are enduring it? speaker-0: That you have to take care of yourself. I think it's it seems so simple. speaker-1: Self care. speaker-0: I know. And I hate and I don't mean like bubble baths and massages. But like it's kind of like speaker-1: Make sure you sleep, make sure you eat. speaker-0: Sleep, eat, drink water, exercise, walk. I mean I speaker-1: Your parent, take care of your kids. speaker-0: you know, and and listen, like there's no shame in taking the medicine. Like when when the FBI first showed up at my house, I could not sleep. Yeah. I just couldn't. I was so terrified. Yeah. And so my doctor, God bless him, was like, You're taking Xanax. And for three months I took Xanax and then I stopped taking it because he's like, Now we're going to stop taking Xanax. But you know, it like it allowed me to sleep and I needed to and there was just no other way to do it. And so if you need whatever kind of medicine you need, like take the medicine. But I think it is very easy to just immediately stop taking care of yourself and this is a marathon, it's not a sprint. speaker-1: I will tell clients when they come in, especially they come in with a spouse or there's a spouse involved, I'll say, You guys need to start going to therapy. Yeah. if you're not in therapy now, start going to therapy. I know. Because it's it the process is so hard on everything, but it's particularly hard relationships, that it's useful to have that space to like force yourself into an hour a week for my clients to say, you guys need to spend time with somebody who's facilitating. the the relationship because it you gotta have it to support yourself through this. speaker-0: Yeah. listen, I didn't take that advice, I'll admit it. I did try I did try individual therapy a few different times during this investigation. I don't know if I've ever told speaker-1: Also tell clients that too. speaker-0: Every single therapist I went to. I would like tell them what was going on and they were like, What? And then it just like speaker-1: There is no like we tap out. speaker-0: response was not helpful. I was like, Okay, we're just gonna next. Yeah, next. We've gotta figure out the next thing. So maybe a therapy doesn't work, but it's good advice. speaker-1: No, but I think, it's all these things that you have to i if it's sort of it's the airplane theory, right? If you've got the kids on the plane, you gotta put your your mask on first. And when it's this process, if your oxygen mask isn't on, you can't do the fifty seven things you need to do. speaker-0: can't and that's everyone's like I can't believe you always got out of bed and I'm like well I had to I had four little kids there was there was no other choice there and I think one thing for anyone going through something like this is that like there will be a day where f you find yourself finally able to hold both to hold like the terror of what you're going through and then the joy of your kid's birthday. Yep. Or the excitement of the changing leaves. Like it it will happen. You kind of can get used to the strangest things and and you will get used to it. speaker-1: we our generation hasn't really hasn't experienced war in a real way. Right. And I mean, we we've sent many people off to fight in foreign bot battlefields, but we didn't experience World War Two. We didn't experience the things that sort of our gr grandparents did and our parents and yeah, Vietnam with the draft. And I think one of the things that means we missed is that like even in the worst of times, I mean, you know, the the bombing of London, they had to carry on life. Yeah. They got married. They gave birth. They had birthdays. they went to school. They went to church. And I think if you take that mentality around an investigation, if you are targeted, that yeah, it's not it's not at all a walk in the park, but it doesn't mean the rest of your life has to stop. And you get to make that choice. speaker-0: You you do, and for a long time, I like for a while, I didn't. I was like, This is hell, we're at war, this is my whole life, there's nothing else. speaker-1: reflex because you're at war so I'm just fa I'm worried about the bullets I'm worried about this and you realize wait a minute I can still go for the walk I can still go to the playground we can take the kids you know on vacation speaker-0: we would drive down to South Carolina to go to the ocean. Like we we lived. Like it wasn't the way that I probably would have lived otherwise, but you it was a life. And I think it's really important to remember that you can do that. You just have to decide to. speaker-1: Yep. I I I was in prison visiting a client, I don't know, a month or two ago, and there was a dad there with his three kids and the kids were all there and and it felt sort of normal, which is both sad in its own way, but also I felt like it was really kind of affirming because you know the kids are sitting on the dad's lap. This is a place where they allowed sort of the luckily it was low enough level they allowed the prisoners to like touch their family. but I I was struck by both you how sad it must be to have a family member in jail, 'cause it's a huge just massive cr just tears a family apart. But also that in those moments, like, you what, we're gonna go see dad, we're gonna spend time with him. And you still find a way to sort of continue to walk through kind of what's happening. and I think you have to find ways, even when you think things are really hard, to be like, all right, we're gonna be normal today. speaker-0: Yeah, you have to try. Yeah. Give it everything you have. speaker-1: So another question we we get that have got a few times is all right, well if they can come in and take your money, is there any sort of safe place for your money? speaker-0: No. No. speaker-1: The government kind of come grab your money every which way. But at the same time, I do think if you go back to the first piece of advice, get a good lawyer, if the government's grabbed your money, you do have some grounds to start fighting. And it may be a lot slower than you want and it may take a lot longer. but you can start to pick fights around that in ways that you you can't with other with if they're if they hadn't taken the money. speaker-0: Actually, that's a really good point because in the investigation that my family went through, the government did use civil forfeiture to seize all of our assets. But because that they did not indict my husband after that, the rules around civil forfeiture required them to file the government to file a civil lawsuit against my husband's bank accounts and my bank accounts because they took my money. And that provided us an avenue to talk with the DOJ, which they might not have spoken to us otherwise. Yep. And to start sharing the truth. speaker-1: hey guys, you got this wrong. And and eventually they they did relent and on that front. So I think that yeah, no, there's no y you can't h maybe I guess if you want to put pennies in the backyard and dig, but they can find those too. speaker-0: I also don't think it's really smart, It's like my husband. It looks bad. And the thing is, like when you are under investigation, don't do things that look bad. Like my husband got a letter the day he got a target letter, he got a letter from the federal prosecutor saying we intend to seize these certain assets, which was really weird. But at that point, like we were on notice, don't move any money out of these bank accounts or it looks bad. And it would have been like another thing for them to look at. speaker-1: Same time I always tell clients, look, if you're not guilty, don't act guilty. Yeah. If you were about to buy if you got that letter from the government and you were about to buy a house and you had contract on three days before, buy the house. Because if go you gotta keep trucking through and live your life. speaker-0: I disagree though, because it's like in my in my family's case, if we'd bought the house, then they would have seized the house. speaker-1: Yeah, maybe. I know but you would still be living there, right? I I I think at the end of the day, like if you're not guilty, don't let the government's sort of steps they take stop you from doing what you're going to do. speaker-0: Yeah. I also I also think people are like, cash. Well, in my family situation, two weeks after they seized our bank accounts, the FBI executed a search warrant on our house. And had we had piles of cash somewhere, they would speaker-1: piles of cat? speaker-0: that would have looked yeah really bad and the government would have taken them. So it really was just like, no, there's there was kind of nowhere speaker-1: Yeah. So the answer is no. There's no secret way to protect your money except if they take it, fight like hell. speaker-0: Yeah. The last question that we had is how do you know if you may become a target? speaker-1: Well, sometimes they'll show up and knock and tell you. Sometimes you'll get a letter. speaker-0: In the mail. speaker-1: Literally. Literally in the mail. Hey, by the or FP FedEx will come sometimes. It'll sometimes you'll get an email that'll say, Hey, you're under investigation. They'll generally say, Here's what we're looking at you for, here are the crimes. it'll be from the prosecutor or the FBI agent. It'll say, If you have a lawyer, you know, have them call us. If you don't have a lawyer, you should probably get one and have them call us. speaker-0: And sometimes you get nothing. Sometimes you get the FBI at your house. speaker-1: Sometimes you get a search warrant. And we've had, some clients who just get indicted. Yeah. Right. but again, to go back to what I said a moment ago, just if especially when you're innocent, just live your life. And if the government wants to come and tell you that you're a target, great. Well, then you can start fighting it then. But a lot of folks were just like, I'm I'm so worried. Maybe they're looking at me, maybe I'm not. That gets you nowhere. speaker-0: You can't stop them. No. Right? you can't I think it's so hard. Yeah, speaker-1: To stop them from investing. speaker-0: you can't stop them from investigating you. And I think it that is a really hard thing to grasp and to hold. Because if you live in a world where you're dealing with a lot of rational processes, you're just thrown into this one with really smart people around you that's not very rational. Totally rational. And you're like, well, if I just explain, everyone will understand. And that is just not true. And you just have to endure. And so to your point, you do have to live your life. You can't just say, I'm just gonna focus solely on this and I will make it go away if I give all of my effort to it. That's not how it works. speaker-1: No, no. I I think another question that has come up, some of the comments about this is, you know, gosh, aren't aren't these folks all guilty or, you know, this person may have gotten to pardon, but clearly they did these things. And I think what I I think it's critical to know about the process is that the truth or falsity of the accusations is like so far down the list of what this process actually elicits, yeah, that it It is I would say so many more clients, for example, plead guilty because of lack of funds or because they want it to be over or for certainty or or the risk levels than because they actually did the thing that they said they did. speaker-0: Yeah, I go back to I think this is a great example for people because it's an investigation a lot of people know. If you remember varsity blues. Absolutely. Where a lot of CEOs and celebrities went to prison because they allegedly paid bribes to a college recruiter to get their kids into college. speaker-1: And to get how ridiculous this is, if you pay a lot of money to a college that they put your name on a building it's okay. It's okay, they're gonna let your kids in and that that kind of bribe is okay. But the government was really upset that people were paying less than that amount to get their kids in. speaker-0: But everybody knows varsity blues and they think of it as this insanely successful DOJ investigation. I th correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it is true that the government did not convict any of their targets through a jury trial. The only people that went to prison. Repeatedly a jury trial. The only people that went to prison are people who pled. And so just to explain the process to you of like, this isn't the government always proving something. And even if they do go to trial and win, it doesn't mean that there is someone who walked in there with an intent to defraud and commit a crime. speaker-1: Yeah, there's a the most famous you know, honest services fraud and wire fraud cases of the last decade have been ones where the government's got convictions and then three years later the Supreme Court has said, well, that's actually not a crime. Yeah. and and so a lot of that I think people don't recognize that especially in this type of kind of white collar cases. Some people have done things that are ethically questionable. Yep. That have probably violated different civil laws they could get sued over. Right. But the line as to what's criminal and not is often just determined by who the government wants to mark a criminal. speaker-0: Right. And then the understanding of the jury of that statute that is ambiguous to begin with. speaker-1: Yeah, and in one jurisdiction the jury's gonna go one way, one jurisdiction. most places, if you're charged with murder, the jury's gonna convict you if they think you did it. Yeah. that is definitely not true for kind of the white collar crimes. There's some jurisdictions that are much more like, well, you know, we're kind of business friendly here and that seems like a reasonable business decision. There's some that are like, Man, you've got money, we don't like that, we're gonna throw you in jail. Right. Even if you did nothing wrong. And those sort of just Which absurdities in the system, I don't think people appreciate how much they play a role and they just sort of, you know, armchair throw at like these are bad folks. Yeah. Yeah. And it's just not it's not accurate. speaker-0: That's not so don't believe everything. speaker-1: Don't believe when you see a n a a press release, be a little bit skeptical about how that press release got got written. speaker-0: I think that's right. speaker-1: Well, thank you all. I appreciate everybody listening and watching. And we've got more ep episodes to come. And until then, keep sending us questions.