Solutions for Organizations Under Threat

Wolfe Associates provides specialist advice to business leaders to solve problems, anticipate crises and navigate special risk situations which threaten the integrity and reputation of the organisation and its executives. 

We assist companies and banks facing major crises threatening the organization's integrity, reputation and strategic interests. We advise on the Brazilian and international anti-corruption and anti-extortion laws.

We investigate organisational and organised crime:
Financial crime, fraud, corporate misconduct, corruption and money laundering.

Our multidisciplinary methodology comprises:
Financial, economic and legal analysis. Corporate intelligence.

Organized crime profiling and organizational theory:
Reverse management consulting and process analysis.

Corporate response:
Problem solving, extortion and crisis management response and negotiation strategy.
International asset tracing and litigation strategy.

Why us?

We have many years more experience in investigations and corporate response than any other international or local firm based in Brazil.

Barry Wolfe, the Managing Partner, has blue chip international academic and professional credentials and an impeccable professional reputation.

We provide discreet counsel on managing and solving the problem.

Our approach is multidisciplinary involving legal, financial, economic, forensic accounting and criminological analysis.

Our approach is to complement and work alongside our clients and their existing international and local advisers.

We are a boutique service, accustomed to dealing with the highest levels of management and our advice is objective, direct and practical.

About Us

Barry Wolfe

Managing Partner
Barry took an LL.B. with First Class Honors from Edinburgh University. He was a Graduate Fellow at Yale Law School and has an LL.M. in International Law from Magdalene College Cambridge University. He is a practicing English Solicitor and Foreign Law Consultant at the Brazilian Bar.

Barry Wolfe, is an international lawyer and criminologist with over 40 year’s experience advising senior management of international companies and banks facing major crises. He has led many major fraud investigations, including the commodities, banking, agribusiness, chemicals, commodities, agribusiness, pharmaceutical, IT, retail, telecommunications, electronic, automotive and mining sectors.

Barry is a specialist in investigation of fraud, white-collar crime and corruption; International litigation strategy, off-shore structures and asset tracing; Parallel markets and money moving; Product contamination and counterfeiting; Industrial sabotage and extortion; Criminal organization profiling; International Corporate Governance and Compliance; and Corporate response and crisis management.

His professional career began at Herbert Smith, a leading international law firm in the City of London.  He has practiced international financial law in Brazil since 1986. He is a former Consultant to Control Risks Group and Director of KPMG Forensic.

Marcelo Pereira

Partner
Marcelo has over 25 years experience in Financial crime investigation, Forensic Accounting,  Audit and Consulting, and M&A Due Diligence in the industrial, commercial and service sectors. He was Manager at PWC Forensic and Transaction Services, Manager at Infinity Group (Ethanol and Biofuels) and Manager at KPMG Forensic and Transaction Services.

He is a qualified accountant and Brazilian lawyer. He took a Bachelors Degree in Accountancy from Universidade Camilo Castelo Branco, MBA in Financial Management, Audit and Control at Fundação Getulio Vargas, and has a Law Degree from Universidade Cruzeiro do Sul.

Karen Schwach

Partner
Karen is a Brazilian lawyer and was Called to the São Paulo Bar in 2008. She is a specialist in Criminal Law, Human Rights Law and Family and Inheritance Law.

She has 17 years’ experience in investigating cases, preparing evidence, and developing and implementing successful defense strategies.

Her cases include drug trafficking, human trafficking and murder, defending victims of modern slavery, religious persecution, abuse of power, torture and discrimination. She has considerable experience in investigating cases, preparing evidence and developing and implementing successful defense strategies.

She holds an LL.B. from FMU University.

What We Do

Investigations

Investigations of financial crime, fraud, bribery and corruption, misconduct, negligence, mismanagement, industrial accidents, anti-trust, industrial espionage, cargo theft, modern slavery and human trafficking.

 Wolfe Associates’ multidisciplinary services include:

 

  • Financial / economic / legal analysis.
  • Forensic audits.
  • Corporate intelligence
  • Organized crime profiling and organizational theory: reverse management consulting and process analysis.

 

Wolfe Associates provides technical criminologicalsupport to investigations carried out by government agencies, where suchagencies lack the necessary resources. Our expert reports are exhibited tocriminal complaints and civil pleadings We give evidence to police andprosecutors and in trails in Brazil and internationally.

 

Our investigations, in addition to identifyingmisconduct and quantifying losses, are also directed to inculcating ethics,integrity and transparency in financial, commercial and business relations.

Crisis Management – Corporate Response

We act as trusted advises to senior management of Brazilian and international companies and banks facing crises which threaten the organisation’s integrity, reputation and strategic interests.

Our corporate response services enable organisations to prevent, plan for and respond to a range of serious problems which threaten these companies conducting business in complex and hostile environments, where the legal systems cannot be relied on adequately to protect the company’s legitimate interests.

Crisis situations may result from:

  • Fraud and improper conduct
  • Corruption, extortion, blackmail
  • Sabotage
  • Defective / contaminated / counterfeit products resulting in damage to life and property
  • Shareholder disputes
  • Suspicious death
  • Organizational crime
  • Organized crime
  • Money laundering
  • Terrorist financing
  • Negligence by external auditors
  • Mismanagement
  • Accidents
  • Inadequate and improper conduct involving employees, including drug abuse and sexual misconduct
  • Cartels
  • Government corruption and bid rigging
  • Modern slavery: human trafficking and forced labour
  • Environmental disasters

Effective response:

  • Renders a potentially unacceptable investment/venture viable.
  • Enables the organisation to understand the exposure – it knows what it is getting into.
  • Enables the organisation to balance the risk/reward ratio when assessing/evaluating investments in complex and hostile environments.
  • Avoids potential risks.
  • Minimises the impact of potential risks.
  • Manages the ongoing event/situation/crisis as opposed to simply managing the results of the risk.
  • Creates a structured environment which:some text
    • Protects the organization, its executives, employees and partners from the general country environment
    • Provides incentives to act with transparency, ethics and integrity
    • Encourages respect, dignity, cooperation, and the ability to count on each other for support.

Litigation Strategy

Litigation strategy and asset tracing in national and international lawsuits.

We advise individuals and companies, both Brazilian and foreign in special situations involving litigation. Whether the client is the victim of a ponzi scheme or a party to a high value divorce, we devise and implement complex litigation strategies in Brazil and abroad, including tracing and freezing assets. We advise corporations involved in complex litigation. We act as an expert witness and provide expert opinions including assessments of improper conduct and quantification of losses resulting from corruption, negligence and mismanagement.

Corporate Governance and Compliance

We provide multidisciplinary solutions tailored to the company's unique leadership style and local Brazilian corporate culture.

Companies must be prepared for and protected in the event of becoming involved, wittingly or unwittingly, in corruption, environmental and human rights investigations. 

Wolfe Associates offers a range of strategic and preventative solutions enabling the company to demonstrate a top down commitment international compliance regulations.

Our methodology includes:

  • Risk and vulnerability diagnostic
  • Prevention through refining corporate culture, controls, processes, and third-party due diligence (suppliers, clients and partners)
  • Panning to detect potential problems, investigate violations and set up and manage whistleblower systems
  • Establish effective integrity and compliance mechanisms and procedures and integrating local compliance with corporate compliance.
  • Incident response, crisis communication and reputation protection
  • Post-event monitoring and ongoing review of controls and procedures

Media

Cases

Video Blog

A series of short videos and podcasts covering topics related to:

War, Terrorism, Genocide, and International Law: Defense, Counterattack, and the Ethics of Violence

I will draw parallels between the challenges faced by leaders of organizations in the “hostile” environment that is today's Brazil, in the new global entropic context, characterized by polarity and populism, with a specific focus on current conflicts and wars. I will address topics, such as:

  • Conviction by “double standards” double standards.
  • The ethics of violence in the business world and in wars.
  • The interesting history of Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity in International Law.
  • The hostile context in Brazil.
  • The new world context characterized by chaos, fragmentation, polarization, and populism.
  • What does “special” mean? Special Counsel, Special Agent, Special Investigator, Special Risks, Special Forces, Special Operations.
  • The role of the Special Advisor Special Adviser in the world dominated by data, AI, and cyberspace.
  • The Inevitability of Evil in the Defense of Good: Andrew Schmookler's Parable of the Tribes
  • Political kidnapping and commercial kidnapping.
  • Commercial sequestration negotiation principles.
  • Archeptic psychology, good and evil, and compliance.
  • The surprise attack.
  • Burning files.
  • Good and evil, quantum physics and business management.
  • Mafias in companies and banks in Brazil.
  • Investigating organizational mafias using black hole theory.
  • Governance and compliance “in English to see”.
  • Terrorism and organized crime.
  • Corruption and terrorism.
  • Terrorist financing and money laundering.
  • Do terrorists use condoms?
  • Brazil — A paradise for money laundering
  • Prevention or reaction.
  • Preventive attack, prevention, defense, or counterattack.
  • Proportionality in the counterattack.
  • Human shields in the international law of war.
  • Justice x peace.
  • The scapegoat in mythology and business management.
coming soon!

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