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George S. Canellos is a partner in the Litigation Department of Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy LLP.
Mr. Canellos began his career as an associate in the Litigation Department of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, where he worked for four years, principally on takeover disputes and securities litigation. In 1994, he became an Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York. During nine years at the United States Attorney's Office, Mr. Canellos served in a number of positions and participated in the prosecution of many high-profile cases. Before joining Milbank, Mr. Canellos was Chief of the Major Crimes Unit, where he supervised a team of prosecutors responsible for investigating and prosecuting large-scale financial crimes such as bank, insurance, health care, and tax fraud, foreign corrupt practices, money laundering, and many forms of investment fraud. In addition, while serving as Senior Trial Counsel of the Securities and Commodities Fraud Task Force, Mr. Canellos was responsible for the prosecution of many individuals and corporations for accounting fraud, investment advisory fraud, insider trading and other violations of the federal securities laws. Mr. Canellos also served as Deputy Chief Appellate Attorney, one of five supervisors in charge of overseeing briefing and argument of all appeals before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Mr. Canellos's practice focuses on civil and criminal enforcement of the securities and banking laws. He has advised many of the nation's leading broker-dealers, investment advisors, and mutual fund companies on compliance with the securities laws and the rules of self-regulatory organizations. Mr. Canellos has led the defense of clients in many of the recent headline investigations of the financial industry, including investigations of a wide variety of accounting practices; revenue-sharing and market-timing practices of mutual funds; soft-dollar and directed brokerage practices of investment advisors and broker-dealers; specialist trading on the New York Stock Exchange; revenue-sharing practices of insurance carriers and brokers; the promotion of tax shelters and strategies by securities and accounting firms, and trading and financial transactions implicating U.S. sanctions laws.
Mr. Canellos has handled many jury and non-jury trials, and briefed and argued dozens of appeals before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and other courts of appeals.
In 1999, Mr. Canellos was named Prosecutor of the Year by the Federal Law Enforcement Foundation, for overall distinction as a federal prosecutor. In the same year, Mr. Canellos received the Director's Award for Superior Performance from the Executive Office of United States Attorneys, for distinction in the investigation and prosecution of a series of insider trading cases. In private practice, Mr. Canellos has been recognized in Chambers USA's listing of America's Leading Lawyers for Business, The Best Lawyers in America, Super Lawyers and in International Who's Who Legal's listing of top business crime lawyers.
Mr. Canellos is an active speaker and writer on the securities laws and policies. He is a member of the Securities Industry Association's Compliance and Legal Division, New York Council of Defense Lawyers and the Federal Bar Council.
Mr. Canellos received his A.B. degree magna cum laude from Harvard College. He received his J.D. degree from Columbia Law School, where he was named a Harlan Fisk Stone scholar for academic distinction in all years. | 