Welcome to Spodek Law Group. Our goal is to give you the reality of federal white collar prosecution in Brooklyn - not the sanitized version other attorneys present, not the Hollywood fiction where the scrappy defendant proves their innocence, but the actual truth about what happens when federal agents show up at your door or your business partner suddenly stops returning calls.
If you found this page at 2am because something just happened - an FBI visit, a subpoena, a nervous call from your accountant - then you need to understand something that will change how you approach the next 48 hours. The federal white collar prosecution machine in the Eastern District of New York is not designed to determine guilt or innocence. It is designed to convict. And by the time you know you are a target, the machine has already been running for months.
What They Already Know About You
Here is the uncomfortable truth that nobody in our profession wants to say out loud: by the time federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York decide to charge you with a white collar crime, they have essentially already won. The conviction rate for wire fraud cases hovers around 88 percent. That number does not represent the system working as intended. It represents prosecutors who only bring cases they are virtually certain to win.
The EDNY does not file charges based on suspicion. They file charges after months - sometimes years - of investigation, document collection, witness interviews, and grand jury presentations. By the time you receive that target letter or those FBI agents knock on your door, the government has built a case file that would fill a moving truck. They know about transactions you forgot happened. They have emails you deleted in 2019. They have already spoken to people you trusted.
Let that sink in.
The Southern District of New York sentenced 1,048 individuals in Fiscal Year 2024, with an average sentence of 59 months and a median of 36 months. These are not slaps on the wrist. These are years of federal prison time that destroy careers, families, and futures. And Brooklyn's Eastern District handles some of the most sophisticated white collar prosecutions in the nation, with a Business and Securities Fraud Section that regularly partners with the SEC, FBI, and FINRA on cases spanning continents.
The reason the conviction rate is so high is not that everyone charged is obviously guilty. It is that prosecutors have become experts at pre-selecting cases they know they can win. They have unlimited resources compared to any defendant. They have the power to grant immunity to witnesses who might otherwise face prosecution themselves. They have years to investigate while you have weeks to respond. The asymmetry is not accidental. It is structural.
What most people do not understand is that the grand jury process - supposedly designed to protect citizens from unfounded prosecution - has become a rubber stamp. Grand juries hear only the prosecution's evidence. There is no cross-examination. There is no defense presentation. The old joke among prosecutors is that a grand jury would indict a ham sandwich, and the data bears this out. Once the grand jury convenes on your case, indictment is essentially guaranteed.
The Intent Trap: How Your Words Become Evidence
Heres the thing most people dont understand about federal white collar prosecution. The government doesnt actually need to prove you did something illegal. What they need to prove is that you KNEW it was illegal when you did it. Criminal intent. Mens rea. The mental state that separates a business mistake from a federal felony.
And heres were it gets dangerous. Your own words become the evidence of that intent.
Think about the emails you send every day. "Make sure this is compliant." "Document everything." "I want to be careful here." "Let's make sure we're following the rules on this one." Those emails show you KNEW the rules. Which means any deviation from those rules wasnt a mistake - it was a willful violation. Your responsible business practices become evidence of criminal sophistication. The very diligence that made you a good business owner becomes the prosecution's exhibit A.
OK so you might be thinking: I'll just cooperate with investigators. I have nothing to hide. This is exactly what they want you to think. And its exactly the trap that destroys most white collar defendants before they ever see a courtroom.
When FBI agents ask to "clear up a few questions" they are not trying to help you. They are not conducting a neutral fact-finding mission. Every word you say is being documented. Every hesitation noted. Every attempt to explain context will be stripped from that context and presented as a damning admission. "I was aware of that transaction" becomes "defendant admits knowledge of the fraudulent scheme." Your attempt at cooperation becomes the cornerstone of their intent element.
As Todd Spodek explains to clients facing this exact situation: the more cooperative you are without counsel present, the more evidence of criminal intent you manufacture against yourself. Its a paradox that seems unfair - but its how the federal system actualy works. Defense attorneys know this. Prosecutors know this. The only people who dont know it are the targets who believe their innocence protects them.
Heres a pattern we see constantly at Spodek Law Group. A successful businessperson gets a call from the FBI. They think, "I've done nothing wrong, I'll just explain the situation." They spend two hours answering questions, trying to be helpful, trying to show they have nothing to hide. Three months later they're indicted. And the centerpiece of the prosecution's case? The statements they made during that "informal conversation." The admissions they didnt even realize they were making.
Why Your CFO Just Became Your Biggest Problem
In September 2024 the EDNY launched something that should terrify every business owner in Brooklyn. They call it a whistleblower program. What it actualy is: a systematic effort to turn your trusted employees into prosecution witnesses.
The way it works is devastating in its simplicity. The EDNY contacts your CFO, your controller, your operations manager - anyone with inside knowledge of your business. They offer a non-prosecution agreement. Complete immunity from charges. All that person has to do is "cooperate" by interpreting your business decisions as evidence of criminal intent.
Heres the kicker. That employee you trusted for ten years? They're now sitting across from federal prosecutors, explaining how your instruction to "maximize revenue" was actualy an order to commit fraud. Your email asking them to "find a solution" becomes evidence of a conspiracy. Every casual conversation, every text message, every Slack DM is being recontextualized to build a case against you.
The psychology of this process is brutal. Your former employee is scared. They've been told they could face charges themselves. They've been offered a way out - but only if they deliver something useful to the prosecution. Suddenly every ambiguous instruction you ever gave becomes crystal clear evidence of criminal intent. Every joke becomes a confession. Every frustrated email becomes a smoking gun.
This isnt hypothetical. In June 2025 the EDNY indicted 15 individuals on healthcare fraud charges alleging over $10.6 billion in fraudulent Medicare and Medicaid billing. Those indictments didnt come from external investigation alone. They came from insiders who flipped. From employees who took the non-prosecution deal and testified against there former bosses.
The same month, the EDNY charged Iurii Gugnin with laundering more then $500 million through the US financial system. His own business partners provided the evidence. The same people he trusted with his companies became the prosecution's star witnesses. This is not unusual. This is the standard playbook.
Sound familiar? It should. Because while your reading this, someone in your organization might already be getting that phone call. And unlike you, they'll have a defense attorney telling them exactly how to save themselves - by giving the prosecution what it needs to destroy you.
The EDNY's whistleblower program follows similar initiatives launched by the SDNY in January 2024 and the DOJ nationally in April 2024. This is coordinated federal policy. Every major prosecutors office in the country is now activly recruiting insiders to testify against there employers. The question isnt whether someone in your organization will be approached. Its whether they've already been approached.
The 48-Hour Window Nobody Tells You About
Heres were defense attorneys have hard data that should change how you think about this situation completly. Studies show a 92 percent success rate in avoiding charges when clients engage defense counsel early in the investigation process - before charges are filed, before grand jury indictments, before the case becomes a formality.
Let that sink in.
92 percent. Thats not a typo. Thats nearly opposite of the 88 percent conviction rate that awaits those who wait until after charges are filed.
But that window closes faster then you think. The moment charges are filed, your odds invert completly. Now your facing an 88 percent conviction rate from prosecutors who only bring cases they expect to win. The same system that gave you 92 percent odds of walking away now gives you 88 percent odds of federal prison.
What happens in that 48-hour window - the first two days after you learn about an investigation - basicly determines the next two decades of your life. The decisions you make. Who you talk to. What you say. What you dont say. Whether you hire counsel or try to "handle it yourself." Whether you reach out to potential witnesses or leave them to be flipped by the prosecution.
At Spodek Law Group we've seen this pattern play out hundreds of times. The clients who call us before talking to investigators almost always achieve better outcomes then clients who tried to cooperate there way out of it first. Its not that cooperation is never appropriate - sometimes it absolutly is. But cooperation without strategy, without understanding what the prosecution is actually looking for, without knowing which admissions help and which destroy, turns your good intentions into prosecution exhibits.
The difference between these two paths cannot be overstated. Pre-charge intervention means negotiating from a position where the prosecution still has uncertainty. Post-charge defense means fighting against a case that prosecutors have already decided meets there burden of proof. The game is fundamentaly different on each side of that charging decision.
What Wire Fraud Actually Means for Your Future
Most people dont understand what wire fraud charges actualy mean until there already facing them. They think "white collar crime" sounds better then violent crime. Less serious. More likely to result in probation or home confinement. Maybe some community service. Maybe a fine.
This is dangerously wrong.
Wire fraud carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison. If the offense involves a financial institution - and in Brooklyn, it almost always does - that maximum jumps to 30 years. Were not talking county jail. Were not talking a halfway house. Were talking federal prison. Mandatory minimums. Sentencing guidelines that judges follow religously.
The average sentence in the Southern District of New York for white collar offenses: 59 months. Thats nearly five years. The median is 36 months - three years. And those are averages, meaning half of defendants recieve even more time.
Federal sentencing works differently then state sentencing. The sentencing guidelines create a grid based on the offense level and your criminal history. Fraud amounts exceeding $250,000 add 12 levels to your base offense. Amounts exceeding $65 million add 24 levels. Each level increases your sentencing range. And unlike state court, theres no good time that cuts your sentence in half. Federal prisoners serve 85 percent of there sentences minimum.
Remember Sean Novis? Sentenced in the EDNY just recently for operating a mass mailing fraud scheme targeting elderly and vulnerable victims. His sentence: 90 months. Seven and a half years in federal prison. Plus forfeiture of $60 million. His co-defendant Gary Denkberg got 66 months and $19 million in forfeiture. A 12-year scheme that ended with sentences that will last longer then many people's careers.
And then theres Bernie Madoff. The ultimate cautionary tale. 150 years for history's largest Ponzi scheme. He died in federal prison in 2021 after serving 12 years. Even the most sophisticated white collar defendant in American history couldnt escape once he was inside the system. Even with the best lawyers money could buy. Even with every possible advantage. The system is designed to convict.
The point isnt that your case is like Madoffs. Its that the federal system is designed to produce convictions once your in it. The resources are overwhelming. The conviction rates are astronomical. The sentences are measured in years, not months. And every day you wait before engaging defense counsel is another day the prosecution uses to make those outcomes more likely.
The EDNY's Expanding Reach
Brooklyn's Eastern District isnt slowing down. In March 2025 they created a Transnational Criminal Organizations Strike Force specificaly designed to coordinate complex financial prosecutions across borders. What this means practicaly: nowhere to hide.
The EDNY has jurisdiction over Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, and Long Island - but there reach extends globally. They've prosecuted defendants located across the United States and around the world. International wire transfers dont create jurisdiction problems for them. They create opportunities.
The Business and Securities Fraud Section regularely partners with the SEC, CFTC, FBI, and FINRA. They coordinate with international law enforcement. They have access to banking records, communications records, and financial data that crosses borders as easily as the transactions they investigate. When your facing a white collar investigation in Brooklyn, your not facing one agency. Your facing a coordinated assault from multiple federal and regulatory bodies, each with there own resources, there own investigators, there own subpoena power.
In Fiscal Year 2024, US Attorney offices filed 4,332 white collar prosecutions nationally - down significantly from previous decades. But this reduction in volume doesnt mean less risk for any individual target. It means MORE resources per case. Fewer prosecutions means each prosecution recieves more attention, more investigation, more preparation. The EDNY isnt spreading thin. They're going deep on the cases they select.
And the new whistleblower programs mean they have eyes inside companys everywhere. The September 2024 EDNY policy promises non-prosecution agreements to individuals who come forward with information about white collar wrongdoing. What they're buying with those agreements: testimony that transforms business decisions into criminal conspiracies, that reframes ambiguous communications as smoking guns, that turns trusted colleagues into prosecution witnesses.
Why Spodek Law Group Before You Talk to Anyone
Theres a reason our phone rings at 2am. Its becuase someone just got a call from there accountant saying FBI agents were asking questions. Or someone just found a grand jury subpoena in there mailbox. Or someone's business partner just called sounding nervous, asking "weird questions" about transactions from three years ago.
Those are the moments that determine outcomes. Not the trial. Not the sentencing hearing. Not the appeal. The first 48 hours after you realize something is wrong.
What Todd Spodek and the team at Spodek Law Group do in those first hours can mean the difference between walking away clean and spending years in federal prison. We've handled hundreds of white collar matters across the Eastern and Southern Districts. We know how these investigations unfold. We know what prosecutors are looking for and how they build intent cases from seemingly innocent communications.
Most importantly, we know how to intervene before charges are filed.
That 92 percent success rate for early intervention isnt luck. Its strategy. Its understanding the investigation timeline. Its knowing when cooperation helps and when it hurts. Its building relationships with prosecutors that allow for negotiated resolutions before indictments ever issue. Its presenting your side of the story before the grand jury hears only the prosecution's version.
The EDNY's average sentence of 59 months isnt inevitable. But avoiding it requires acting before the system has already decided your guilty. Before your CFO takes that non-prosecution deal. Before your emails have been recontextualized as evidence of criminal intent. Before the grand jury has heard only the prosecution's side of the story.
We understand the stakes. We understand the fear. We understand that your reading this because something just changed in your life and you dont know what to do next. The answer is not to try to figure it out yourself. The answer is not to cooperate your way into an indictment. The answer is not to wait and see what happens.
The clock started the moment you learned about this. Every hour you wait is an hour the prosecution uses to build there case. Every conversation you have without counsel present is potential evidence. Every email you send, every text, every decision about what to delete or preserve - all of it matters.
They had months. Sometimes years. You have days.
Call Spodek Law Group at 212-300-5196. Not tomorrow. Not after you "figure out whats going on." Not after you talk to your accountant or your business partner or anyone else. Now. Because the window that gives you 92 percent odds is closing. And once it closes, your facing a system with an 88 percent conviction rate thats designed to ensure you never had a chance.
This call costs nothing. Not making it costs everything.
