Kathryn C. Goyer is a partner in the firm of McDermott Will & Emery LLP and is a member of the Firm’s White-Collar & Securities Defense Practice Group. Kathryn has professional experience in accounting and finance, and often represents clients in the financial sector. She is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA), with audit experience from a Big Four accounting firm, and worked as a financial analyst at a publicly-traded company. In 2010, Kathryn was seconded to a major financial services firm, where she worked in the Regulatory Inquiries group and primarily dealt with broker-dealer regulation.
Kathryn focuses her practice on SEC defense, securities litigation, broker-dealer regulation and matters involving complex accounting and financial issues. She has represented both U.S. and non-U.S. clients in SEC, FINRA, PCAOB and DOJ matters involving alleged accounting fraud, valuation of financial instruments (FAS 157), derivatives/hedge accounting (FAS 133), reinsurance accounting, revenue recognition, earnings management, insider trading, Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), municipal bonds and interest rate swaps, options backdating, energy derivatives, market manipulation and financial reporting and disclosures related to the “subprime” market.
Kathryn also has experience representing broker-dealers and investment advisors in regulatory proceedings, including inquiries regarding options trading, market timing, wash trades, anti-money laundering (AML), micro-cap securities (“penny stocks”), unregistered offerings and reasonabe inquiry obligations under R144. In a recent trial victory, Kathryn participated in the successful defense of the former Chief Investment Officer of a major asset management firm. The case involved fraud charges brought by the SEC, based on disclosures during the credit crisis to sophisticated investors in an unregistered investment fund.
Kathryn has frequently applied her first-hand understanding of the public accounting profession to represent auditors in SEC investigations, securities class actions and professional malpractice claims. She has also advised accounting firms on developing and implementing remedial actions, including FCPA training for auditors. Kathryn has also assisted publicly-traded companies with effective internal controls, both for financial reporting and FCPA compliance.
Kathryn is a co-author of “Defending Auditors at the Pleading Stage,” published in Accounting Policy & Practice, Vol. 5 No. 17 (August 21, 2009). She is also the author of “Nancy Temple’s Duty: Professional Responsibility and the Arthur Andersen Verdict,” published in the Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics, Vol. 18, No. 1 (Fall/Winter 2004).
Prior to law school, Kathryn lived and worked in South Africa and was a frequent author and lecturer on HIV/AIDS and prison issues. She has focused her pro bono work at the Firm on prison and detention issues, including representing Guantanamo Bay detainees.
Kathryn is admitted to practice in New York and before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Education
- Georgetown University Law Center, J.D. (cum laude), 2005
- University of KwaZulu-Natal, M.A. (with Distinction), 2001
- University of Notre Dame, B.A. (magna cum laude), 1996
