Breon Peace, Biden’s nominee for U.S. Attorney in Brooklyn, is a longtime white-collar, civil lawyer with global experience

August 11, 2021 Brooklyn Eagle Staff

Breon Peace, President Joe Biden’s nominee for the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, headquartered in Brooklyn. YouTube photo

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Breon Peace, who President Joe Biden on Tuesday nominated to lead the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York, headquartered in Brooklyn, is a veteran attorney specializing in white-collar defense, complex civil litigation and regulatory enforcement matters.

He was one of several nominees for U.S. Attorney offices nationwide announced by President Biden.

Peace formerly worked in the Eastern District office from 1999 to 2002 under former Attorney General Loretta Lynch when she served as the U.S. attorney there.

Peace is a partner in Cleary Gottleib Steen & Hamilton LLP. He has been with the firm since 1996, except for the aforementioned period starting in 1999 when he left the firm to join the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District, where he served as an assistant U.S. Attorney.

According to information he provided, while at the U.S. Attorney’s Office, he handled a wide array of federal criminal investigations and prosecutions trying cases to verdict and arguing appeals before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

“Those years with the U.S. Attorney’s Office were phenomenal,” he said in a Metropolitan Black Bar Association seminar on YouTube.

Then, from August 2002 to July 2003, Peace was an acting assistant professor of clinical law at New York University School of Law . He rejoined Cleary Gottleib in September 2003.

Among the highlights of his tenure with the firm have been representing BNP Paribas, a French international banking corporation, in federal court litigation related to Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme; and representing HSBC in various investigations conducted by regulatory agencies here as well as in Latin America, Europe and Asia.

The Eastern District has regularly been involved in high-profile prosecutions and investigations. For example, the Office is overseeing the investigation of Tom Barrack, the chair of Trump’s 2017 inaugural committee, who has pleaded not guilty to charges that he secretly lobbied the U.S. on behalf of the United Arab Emirates.

In September 2020, Peace participated in a panel titled, “Ethical Considerations for Corporate Investigations in the World of COVID-19, hosted virtually by the New York City Bar, September 16, 2020. He also was named “Private Practitioner of the Year” by the Metropolitan Black Bar Association.

In addition, President Biden picked Damian Williams for the top spot in Manhattan’s Southern District of New York. Williams would be the first Black person to run the Manhattan office.

Williams is currently chief of the securities and commodities task force in the Southern District office, where he oversees more than 20 prosecutors.