Wilson Sonsini tech engineer charged with insider trading
(Adds different spelling of Braverman's first name, details from SEC complaint)
By Nate Raymond and Jonathan Stempel
NEW YORK, Sept 16 (Reuters) - An information technology engineer at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati was arrested on Tuesday and charged with insider trading on information he learned while working at the prominent Silicon Valley law firm.
Dimitry Braverman, 41, was charged with one count of securities fraud in a criminal complaint filed in New York. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filed a parallel civil lawsuit.
Authorities said Braverman from 2010 to 2013 made close to $300,000 from illegal trades in stocks and options of eight companies, including Drugstore.com Inc, Dealertrack Technologies Inc and Seagate Technology Plc, involved in transactions on which Wilson Sonsini was providing legal advice.
Prosecutors said the scheme stopped for 1-1/2 years in April 2011 after Wilson Sonsini associate Matthew Kluger was arrested in a separate insider trading scheme prosecuted in New Jersey.
Yet they said Braverman resumed his scheme, using a brokerage account in the name of a relative in Russia, after Kluger was sentenced in June 2012 to a record 12 years in prison.
Authorities said Braverman had access to non-public information about the transactions through his job maintaining and designing software for Wilson Sonsini's finance operations.
Courtney Dorman, a Wilson Sonsini spokeswoman, called the case "deeply disturbing to say the least." She also said the firm put Braverman on unpaid administrative leave upon learning about the arrest, and is cooperating with authorities.
"Client confidentiality is at the center of all we do, and we have strict policies and internal controls established to protect it," Dorman said in a statement.
Wilson Sonsini has offices in Palo Alto, California and more than one dozen other locations.
A lawyer for Braverman could not immediately be identified. The defendant is identified as Dmitry Braverman in the criminal complaint, and Dimitry by the SEC and Wilson Sonsini.
According to the criminal complaint, Braverman also tipped another person who engaged in two of the suspect trades. The SEC lawsuit said that person was his brother.
The case marked the latest in a string of insider trading prosecutions under Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara, whose office has secured convictions of 81 people since October 2009.
According to court documents, Wilson Sonsini's general counsel emailed employees after Kluger's arrest to remind them of the firm's policies on insider trading.
But authorities said Braverman in November 2012 opened the new brokerage account, in the name of his relative Vitaly Pupynin, and resumed his scheme, conducting at least four more illegal trades through December 2013.
The SEC named Pupynin as a relief defendant to recover alleged illegal gains held in the brokerage account. A lawyer for Pupynin could not be immediately located.
The cases in the U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, are U.S. v. Braverman, No. 14-mj-02031, and SEC v. Braverman, 14-07482.
(Reporting by Nate Raymond in New York; Editing by Peter Galloway and Tom Brown)
