U.S. District Judge William Pauley has dismissed the lawsuit brought against Siemens A.G. by a former compliance officer who claimed that Siemens’ Chinese subsidiary used kickbacks to boost medical equipment sales, ruling that Dodd-Frank’s anti-retaliation protections for whistleblowers do not apply outside the United States.
Lofchie Comment: The judge takes a dim view of broad claims of the extra-territorial application of U.S. law, even in a situation in which the court accepts, for the sake of argument, an allegation of wrongdoing. This obviously has direct significance for whistleblowers, but also raises further questions as to the vulnerability of the CFTC’s broad assertion of global jurisdiction under Dodd-Frank.
See: Meng-Lin Liu v. Siemens A.G., Memorandum and Order.