Michael Ward > Baker Botts L.L.P. > Palo Alto, United States > Lawyer Profile

Michael Ward

+1 650 739 7538 michael.ward@bakerbotts.com View profile

Work Department

Litigation

Position

Partner

Career

Michael Ward is a partner in the Palo Alto office. His practice focuses on assisting senior executives and corporate boards by leading responses to critical enforcement challenges, such as government and internal investigations. He also emphasizes the need for companies to protect shareholder value and senior leaders from enforcement action by taking proactive and practical measures that reduce the likelihood and severity of an enforcement action. His rare background having experience both as a former federal prosecutor and a chief compliance officer enables him to understand and anticipate enforcer perceptions and provide clients with practical and actionable guidance to address those concerns.

Mike has deep enforcement experience having served 16 years as an Assistant United States Attorney for the U.S. Department of Justice in Minneapolis, where he led multiple federal crime investigations, tried over 50 federal criminal jury trials. He supervised the investigation and prosecution of numerous federal crimes, including public corruption, insider trading, money laundering, terrorist financing, bank fraud, currency transaction structuring, price fixing, government contracting frauds and export control violations. After a long career as a federal prosecutor, Mike took a position with Target Corporation where he led the retail company’s worldwide internal investigations function including fraud within its global supply chain. He also designed and implemented Target’s first corporate compliance program. Mike subsequently moved to McKesson Corporation in San Francisco where he was Director of Ethics & Compliance for the global pharma and healthcare distribution company. Thereafter, Mike has served as Chief Compliance Officer and designed and led award winning compliance programs at a series of leading companies in Silicon Valley including Adobe Systems, Cisco Systems and Juniper Networks.

At Juniper, Mike served as a chief risk and compliance officer for a Silicon Valley-based networking equipment company. Notably, he oversaw a six-year Foreign Corrupt Practices Act investigation that spanned across multiple countries. He also led a worldwide ethics and compliance program, enterprise risk management program, and multiple legal operations teams. Mike is experienced in implementing best practices in corporate compliance programs that demonstrate companies’ commitments to fulfilling their legal obligations.

Memberships

State Bar of California

American Bar Association, White Collar Section

California Lawyers Association, Criminal Law Section

Instructor, Society of Corporate Compliance & Ethics

Board Member: Bay Area Ethics & Compliance Association (BECA)

Board Member: High Tech Compliance Group

Clerkship: Hon. Oliver Seth, Chief Judge of U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit

Education

J.D., George Washington University Law School 1985

B.A., Accounting, University of Minnesota 1982