Friday, August 19, 2011
Page 3
Nathan Hochman Confirmed as Newest Member of Los Angeles City Ethics Commission
By a MetNews Staff Writer
The Los Angeles City Council yesterday confirmed City Attorney Carmen Trutanich’s selection of Bingham McCutchen partner Nathan Hochman to a post on the City Ethics Commission.
He remarked yesterday that his parents “were both immigrants to the city of Los Angeles over 60 years ago and the city has given them, my family and myself enormous opportunities, so it is a pleasure to be able to give back to the city and serve it diligently on the Los Angeles City Ethics Commission.”
Hochman said his background as a prosecutor and in defense work has allowed him “to grapple with ethics issues on both sides of the fence for the past 20 years,” and that he hoped to “be able to sue that skill set to tackle the city’s ethic issues on both the policy and enforcement levels.”
The commission, established in 1990, is charged with administering the public matching funds program, receiving expenditure statements from candidates and office holders, auditing campaign committees, and investigating complaints regarding violations of ethics, campaign finance and lobbying laws.
It is comprised of five members who serve staggered five-year terms, nominated by the mayor, City Council president, City Council president pro tem, city attorney, and controller. Nominations are subject to review by the Rules and Elections Committee and confirmation by the City Council.
Hochman’s practice at Bingham focuses primarily on white collar criminal defense and tax matters. Prior to joining the firm, Hochman was the assistant U.S. attorney general in charge of the Tax Division of the Department of Justice, a post to which he was appointed by then-President George W. Bush in 2007.
After graduating magna cum laude from Brown University and attending Stanford Law School, Hochman joined the State Bar in 1988 and clerked for U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson of the Central District of California.
He was an assistant U.S. attorney in Los Angeles from 1990 to 1997 where he served as the office’s environmental crimes coordinator for almost two years and then spearheaded the Los Angeles Disaster Fraud Task Force, which investigated and prosecuted individuals accused of defrauding disaster assistance programs, more than 70 of whom were convicted.
Hochman received the Department of Justice’s Director’s Award for superior performance as an assistant United States attorney, the Inspector General’s Award of Excellence, the Federal Bar Association’s Young Federal Lawyer Award, and the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association’s Prosecutorial Award.
He left the office to join the law firm co-founded by his father, Bruce Hochman, who died in 2001. He left that firm, which came to be known as Hochman, Salkin, Rettig, Toscher & Perez, to accept the appointment as assistant attorney general.
Copyright 2011, Metropolitan News Company