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From Bridgegate to Wall Street: Kelly, Blaszczak, and the scope of insider trading liability

25 January 2021

Since the Supreme Court's May 2020 decision in the "Bridgegate" case, United States v. Kelly, the scope of the decision’s impact on federal white collar criminal prosecution has been an open question. The potential implications for insider trading prosecutions were made clear on January 11, 2021, in the case of Blaszczak v. United States, with the Supreme Court vacating a 2020 decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit that had affirmed four insider trading convictions. By remanding the case in light of Kelly, the Supreme Court will require the Second Circuit to reexamine whether confidential government information may be considered property under federal anti-fraud statutes—the outcome of which could have a lasting impact on insider trading and other criminal prosecutions implicating government property.