A day after US President Donald Trump paused FCPA enforcement, a New Jersey federal judge asked prosecutors to share their plans for two former Cognizant executives’ upcoming foreign bribery trial.
“In light of the Executive Order issued yesterday by the President, the United States shall state its position as to the upcoming trial”, the judge said in an 11 February entry ordering the DOJ to submit a letter by 18 February.
On 10 February, US President Trump issued an executive order placing all FCPA enforcement actions on pause for six months while Attorney General Pam Bondi writes new enforcement guidelines. The trial is scheduled to start on 3 March.
Defendants Gordon Coburn and Steven Schwartz are due to face FCPA and related conspiracy and recordkeeping charges for their alleged involvement in a scheme to allow an Indian construction company to pay and conceal bribes to get government permission for office campus construction projects.
They were indicted in 2019 after Cognizant settled SEC charges for $25 million and received a declination with a $3 million disgorgement order from the DOJ. Coburn formerly served as Cognizant’s president and Schwartz as its legal officer. They both left the company in 2016.
Their trials have already been pushed back several times, most recently in August after prosecutors cited delays in obtaining witness testimony from India.
A pre-trial evidentiary conference remains scheduled for 20 February.
A spokesperson for Schwartz declined to comment. A DOJ spokesperson and lawyers for Coburn have been contacted for comment.
This article was first published in Lexology PRO's sister title Global Investigations Review (GIR) on 13 February 2025
Counsel to Gordon Coburn
Jones Day
Partner Hank Walther in Washington DC, and partners Henry Klehm, James Loonam, Sarah Efronson and associates Abigael Bosch and Alexander Gonzalez in New York
Krieger Lewin
Partner Nicholas Lewin in New York
Counsel to Steven Schwartz
Paul Weiss
Partners Theodore Wells, Roberto Finzi, Justin Lerer and associate Kyle Sieber in New York
Gibbons
Partners Anne Collart, Lawrence Lustberg and John Haggerty in Newark
Bohrer
Partner Jeremy Bohrer and counsel Jonathan Jason in New York
For the DOJ
Assistant US attorneys Jonathan Fayer and Rachelle Navarro in Newark, trial attorneys Connor Mullin and Paul Ream and acting FCPA unit principal assistant chief Keith Edelman