Keller/Anderle LLP is delighted to announce that former Chief of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Orange County, Ben Barron has joined K/A as a partner, where he will draw on his 15 years of criminal trial attorney experience to enhance and expand the firm’s high-stakes commercial and white-collar defense trial practices.
As Chief of the Orange Country office, Mr. Barron led a team of 40 trial attorneys and professional staff in prosecuting complex federal crimes including securities fraud, public corruption, and racketeering. He also served as Special Counsel to the United States Attorney on Opioids and as Deputy Chief of the International Narcotics, Money Laundering, and Racketeering Section.
Mr. Barron is recognized within the U.S. Department of Justice as an authority on matters involving healthcare fraud, opioid diversion, and kickback violations. Among his other accomplishments, Mr. Barron has successfully prosecuted more than two dozen medical professionals, led the first enforcement program in DOJ history focused on fraud and kickback schemes in the substance abuse treatment industry, and has trained prosecutors and federal agents throughout the country.
Mr. Barron’s other major cases include a 47-defendant prosecution of a kingpin-designated transnational organization responsible for murder and multi-ton cocaine trafficking; a 38-defendant racketeering indictment of a Mexican Mafia-affiliated street gang; an 18-defendant prosecution of a $20 Medicare fraud scheme perpetrated by Eurasian organized crime; an 18-defendant prosecution of a Sinaloa-affiliated network; and a six-defendant prosecution against the owners of three wholesale drug companies for a $20 million tax fraud and currency structuring scheme.
Mr. Barron received numerous awards in recognition of his service in the U.S. Attorney’s Office, including DOJ’s prestigious Director’s Award for Superior Performance by an Assistant United States Attorney, an OCDETF Director’s Award for Individual Achievement, the Department of Homeland Security’s SAC Achievement Award, and the Prosecutor of the Year Award from the California Narcotic Officers’ Association.
Mr. Barron served as a law clerk for the Honorable Diarmuid F. O’Scannlain of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He received his law degree, magna cum laude, from Harvard Law School, where he was Articles Editor for the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy.