Extract from IPRO’s “Corporate Internal Investigations: A Beginner’s Guide”
Internal investigations and regulatory inquiries are a major source of concern for corporate legal staff—and the COVID-19 pandemic isn’t helping matters any.
That’s according to the Norton Rose Fulbright Litigation Trends Survey 2020, which found that, compared with other types of legal disputes, investigations and regulatory matters were the second-highest cause for concern. Additionally, almost half of respondents—45 percent—reported that they expect COVID-19 issues to drive an increase in their volume of disputes throughout 2021.
An investigation isn’t bound by court rules or procedures—in fact, there’s no one way to handle every potential complaint.
Not every complaint leads to an investigation: sometimes a company may decide that a claim is so unsubstantiated, or its allegations so minor, that it does not warrant further inquiry. But the comparison to litigation matters is useful because a corporate internal investigation involves an ediscovery-like fact-finding exercise that includes both reviewing documents and interviewing witnesses.
