Professor J.W. Verret

Professor J.W. joined Lawrence Law in 2022 as Counsel. J.W. dedicates his practice to representing clients in investigations and litigation concerning securities and financial regulations, cryptocurrency regulations, FCPA matters, and corporate governance. He is also a tenured professor of securities law, corporation law, banking law, and accounting at the George Mason University Antonin Scalia Law School. Before pursuing his teaching career, J.W. practiced at a large international firm in U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) enforcement defense focused on internal investigations, financial fraud, and FCPA matters.

Watch J.W. confront SEC Chairperson Gary Gensler during an SEC Investor Advisory Committee hearing:

J.W. is a member of the American Bar Association Business Law Section’s Corporate Governance Committee, where he chairs the SEC subcommittee. He is also a Certified Public Accountant in the Commonwealth of Virginia, a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE), a Certified Valuation Analyst (CVA) and is certified by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) in financial forensics (CFF). He is a current member of the Financial Accounting Standards Board Advisory Council, the principal advisory committee that assists the FASB in the development of Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP).

Prior to joining Lawrence Law, J.W. served as Senior Counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Financial Services, where he led congressional oversight of the SEC and the Federal Reserve. He also led an investigation into leaks of confidential information about monetary policy decisions at the Federal Reserve that led to the resignation of the President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond. J.W. also served on the SEC’s Investor Advisory Committee, where he advised the SEC Chairman and Commissioners on investor protection rules and policies. During his term on the SEC IAC, he was the chairman of the market structure and exchange regulation subcommittee.

J.W.’s work has been published in venues such at the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Business Lawyer, the Stanford Law Review, the Harvard Business Law Review, among other publications.

Professor Verret was elected to the Board of Directors of the Zcash Foundation by the Zcash community.  The Zcash Foundation supports the Zcash blockchain and sponsors research in zero-knowledge proof cryptography that is widely used in cryptocurrency projects.