Scott Armstrong
Trial Attorney and Investigations Defense
Scott Armstrong is a Principal at McGovern Weems where he does one thing: defend individuals in high-stakes investigations and at trial.
Scott is based in Washington, D.C. and defends individuals across the country.
With fifteen jury trials in federal courts around the country and nearly a decade of experience as a senior-level, federal prosecutor, Scott provides unwavering advocacy on behalf of clients.
Scott defends individuals against allegations of fraud and other white-collar offenses, including healthcare fraud, computer fraud, procurement fraud, securities fraud, commodities fraud, identity theft, import/export fraud, price fixing, false statements, and bank fraud. Whatever the case, clients rely on Scott to defend them at every turn.
To learn more about Scott and the team at McGovern Weems, visit McGovernWeems.com.
To track legal developments for defending white-collar cases, check out the Legal Updates.
Healthcare Defense
Scott defends medical professionals and executives based on his years of experience at the nation’s leader in healthcare-fraud cases: the DOJ’s Fraud Section. With first-chair experience at DOJ in cases involving over $600 million in fraudulent healthcare claims, Scott can quickly navigate and defend individuals in a range of healthcare cases.
Scott focuses primarily on defending individuals in investigations and cases involving allegations of healthcare fraud, violations of the Anti-Kickback Statute, false statements relating to a healthcare matter, major fraud against the United States, and the diversion of controlled substances (opioids) under the Controlled Substances Act.
Financial Fraud Defense
Scott defends executives, traders, financial advisors, and other financial professionals across the capital markets. As a senior supervisor at the DOJ’s Fraud Section, Scott handled and supervised high-profile trials around the country involving securities fraud, commodities fraud, market manipulation, and insider trading. These cases spanned financial products, to include U.S. Treasuries, commodities, futures contracts, and equities.
Scott now uses his hard-nosed trial skills, deep knowledge of these markets, and familiarity with complex trading data to defend executives and traders in a range of investigations brought by the DOJ, CFTC, SEC, FINRA, the NYAG, and State Securities Boards.
Cryptocurrency Defense
Scott has critical trial and investigation experience to defend and counsel individuals in every corner of the cryptocurrency market. As a senior supervisor at DOJ, Scott supervised investigations and prosecutions involving crypto-Ponzi schemes, “rug pulls” involving NFTs, “pig butchering” schemes, “cherry picking” schemes involving cryptocurrency futures, and investment-fraud schemes involving various cryptocurrencies and tokens.
By coupling his deep knowledge of blockchains and defi protocols with his trial experience in cryptocurrency cases, Scott defends individuals facing a range of allegations of fraud and manipulation in the cryptocurrency markets.
Trial Defense
In high-stakes disputes, experience and talent matters. Scott has both. He has tried 15 criminal cases in federal courts around the country involving a range of multimillion-dollar fraud schemes and white-collar offenses.
Scott’s clients can confidently rely on his experience, judgment, and hard-earned trial skills to defend them when it matters most. Given his trial experience, Scott also joins up with other attorneys to navigate a complex case through trial.
Investigations
Scott defends clients in a range of investigations. This work includes the defense of clients who receive a grand jury subpoena, a civil investigative demand, a request for an interview from a law enforcement agent, an audit of records from an insurance company, or an inquiry from a medical board.
In this work, Scott defends individuals against a range of government actors and regulators, including DOJ, SEC, CFTC, FINRA, private health insurers, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), various Medicaid Fraud and Control Units (MFCU), the Texas State Securities Board, the New York State Attorney General (NYAG), Health and Human Services, Office of State of Inspector General (HHS-OIG), medical boards, and other licensing boards.
High-Stakes Business Disputes
Scott litigates on behalf of individuals who have been defrauded or otherwise cheated in business disputes and investments.
Scott’s substantial trial experience as a federal prosecutor allows him to aggressively defend the interests of his clients from day one through trial, if necessary. As he did as a federal prosecutor, Scott dives into the facts and pursues the matter until a fair resolution can be brokered for his clients.
This work includes filing civil claims against entities and individuals for fraudulent business dealings and taking the case through trial, if necessary.
Tried and Tested Across The USA
Over fifteen years, Scott’s jury trial and criminal-litigation experience has spanned federal courts around the United States, to include:
Alexandria, Virginia
Atlanta, Georgia
Chicago, Illinois
Columbus, Ohio
Dallas, Texas
Denver, Colorado
Detroit, Michigan
Greenbelt, Maryland
Houston, Texas
Knoxville, Tennessee
Los Angeles, California
Miami, Florida
Nashville, Tennessee
New Orleans, Louisiana
Newark, New Jersey
New York, New York
Washington, DC
Contact Scott at McGovern Weems
Phone: (202) 978-1267
Email: scott@mcgovernweems.com
Website: mcgovernweems.com
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Scott defends clients who are investigated or charged across the healthcare space for fraud relating to Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance. Scott defends owners, doctors and nurses against allegations of healthcare fraud, violations of the Anti-Kickback Statute, and false statements relating to a healthcare matter. These cases involve billing for medically unnecessary services or “upcoding” involving genetic testing, laboratory tests, orthotic braces, durable medical equipment (DME), telemedicine, home health services, injection or infusion therapies, and prescription medication (including opioid diversion).
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Scott defends clients who are investigated or charged across the cryptocurrency industry by law enforcement and federal and state regulators. Scott defends executives, engineers, and marketers in cases involving alleged fraudulent statements about cryptocurrency returns, bitcoin mining operations, money laundering using tumblers or mixers and “chain hopping,” “social engineering” hacks and exploits, market manipulation involving spoof and wash trading, and “rug pulls” involving NFTs, Meme coins, and utility tokens.
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Scott defends executives and financial professionals across the capital markets. This work involves defending against allegations of Ponzi schemes, market manipulation, false and misleading statements to investors, “cherry picking” schemes, insider trading, and the sale of unregistered securities.
These cases often start as a civil investigation by a regulator, such as the CFTC, SEC or NYAG. Scott defends these cases with an eye toward protecting his client’s long-term interests in the event the case is ever referred to criminal authorities.
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With nearly a decade of experience as a federal prosecutor and senior supervisor, Scott vigorously defends and prosecutes the business interests of individuals and startups in various civil litigation.
Scott, for example, relies on his cryptocurrency background to identify and recover cryptocurrency assets that have been stolen or fraudulently obtained through various schemes.
Scott also litigates on behalf of employees who have been wrongfully terminated or otherwise cheated out of compensation.