Randa Abdelhamid is an Associate Director in the Financial Crime, Fraud, and Investigative Services practice with Guidehouse. Randa has over ten years of international experience in leading and conducting fraud investigations and enhanced due diligence investigations for clients in various industries, with expertise in coordinating sensitive international investigations. She specializes in assisting commercial and public sector clients in cross-border and domestic matters relating to fraud investigations, anti-bribery and corruption, anti-money laundering, asset tracing and forensic accounting. Randa also has extensive experience in the fields of Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) violations, Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and international sanctions.

Randa currently co-leads a team of fraud specialists and investigators performing reviews of applications submitted by landlords and tenants in connection with a state Emergency Rental and Assistance Program (“ERAP”) which provides assistance to landlords and tenants impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.  Randa’s team performs targeted reviews of applications as well as horizontal analysis reviews to identify anomalies in large sets of applications to identify indicia of fraud and/or potential misrepresentation.

Randa earned a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the American University in Cairo and a Bachelor of Arts in Business Administration from the same school. She is also a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE) and a Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist (CAMS).
 

Matt Episcopo has redefined the formula for personal power, leadership and business success. Matt knows that the real way to become effective is to build credibility, trust and solid relationships. When we establish trust and credibility, others will say “Yes” to our ideas, products and services. His efforts have helped companies around the world improve their leadership, customer retention and employee engagement. From start-ups to Fortune 500’s,

Matt is widely recognized as an energizing and engaging presenter. He is author of the books “How to Gain the Upper Hand, P.O.W.E.R, Tactics that Get Leaders Results.” Real life experience and results are what fuels this relationship-generating powerhouse. A Medal of Honor recipient with more than 21 years of law enforcement experience, Matt will teach you how to engage with virtually anyone.

Matt’s presentations have been given in Dubai, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Canada, Aruba, Bahamas, as well as across the United States.

John J. Hall, CPA, has worked as an auditor, professional speaker, consultant and author for over 45 long, long years. But he still LOVES the work.

John builds and delivers live and virtual keynote presentations, skills training seminars, Webinars and in-person conference presentations for auditors, management groups, CPAs, Boards, and professional associations – over 3,000 live presentations to date. John is best known for bringing practical, proven, efficient solutions to real-world business challenges (including especially fraud risks!!!) faced by clients and program participants. 

John is the founder and President of Hall Consulting, Inc. In addition to 30-plus years as a self-employed speaker, auditor and consultant, John has worked in senior leadership positions in large corporations and international public accounting and consulting firms. He’s a member of the National Speakers Association, the American Institute of CPAs, and the Institute of Internal Auditors.

Meet John at www.JohnHallSpeaker.com 
Email John at John@JohnHallSpeaker.com

For information on tailored in-house virtual or live in person presentations for your employees, clients or conferences, just call John at 312-560-9931 to kick around ideas.
 

New York State Inspector General Lucy Lang is a lifelong New Yorker, attorney, and educator. Prior to her appointment as New York State’s 11th Inspector General in October 2021, Lang served as Director of the Institute for Innovation in Prosecution (IIP), a national criminal justice reform think tank. She also served as an Assistant District Attorney in Manhattan, where she investigated and prosecuted violent crimes including homicides, gun violence, and domestic abuse, as well as Special Counsel for Policy and Projects. Lang brings her longstanding commitment to justice to bear in the Office’s investigations into corruption, waste, fraud, abuse, and misconduct in state government as well as deep experience designing and implementing practices that promote institutional integrity, transparency, and accountability.

While at the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and in collaboration with Columbia University’s Center for Justice, IG Lang created Inside Criminal Justice, a first-of-its-kind college class for incarcerated students and prosecutors to study criminal justice together and develop policy proposals to better the system for all involved. This is a national model being replicated by other District Attorney’s offices and correctional facilities across the country. Lang has been widely recognized for her work, including receiving the Elizabeth Hurlock Beckman Award from the American Psychological Association in 2020 as an educator who inspires her students in prison to make a difference in their communities.

Inspector General Lang is currently Vice Chair of the American Bar Association Criminal Justice Section, a member of the Council on Criminal Justice, and a Term Member of the Council on Foreign Relations. She has been published in The New York Times, The Atlantic, the New York Daily News, and many others. Lang is the author of March On!, a children's book about the 1915 Women's March for Suffrage in New York City which encourages the next generation of courageous and thoughtful leaders.

Inspector General Lang is a graduate of Swarthmore College and Columbia Law School, where she was the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Gender and Law and has served as a Lecturer-in-Law.

She was appointed to and served on the New York State Bar Association Task Forces on Racial Injustice and Police Reform in 2020-21, and on Racism, Social Equity, and the Law in 2021-22.

Taylor is a senior manager with Ernst & Young LLP. He currently supports the Forensic & Integrity Services US practice and is responsible for bringing the full depth of forensic and integrity services to our US government clients.

Taylor has more than 12 years of experience focusing on program integrity and fraud prevention and detection. He specializes in helping government agencies enhance their anti-fraud programs to align with leading practices, including conducting fraud risk assessments, applying data analytics, conducting investigations, and developing and implementing enterprise-level anti-fraud strategies in complex environments.

Prior to joining EY US, Taylor spent 11 years with another global accounting and consulting firm where he led a practice focused on proactive fraud risk mitigation for government agencies.

Taylor holds a BA in Economics from Wabash College and Master of Public Affairs from Indiana University. He is an active member of the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE) and Association of Government Accountants (AGA). He currently serves on the board of directors for the ACFE Washington DC Chapter as an Associate Director at Large and Membership Committee Co-Chair.

Tanya LeClair is an Associate Director with Guidehouse’s Financial Crime, Fraud, and Investigative Services practice. She has extensive experience in performing fraud investigations, forensic accounting, financial analyses, and valuation services.
Tanya currently co-leads a team of fraud specialists and investigators on an engagement for a state Emergency Rental Assistance Program, where she has been involved in the development of policies and procedures, implementation of controls, project risk management, and investigations of applications that exhibit potential indicia of fraud.
Prior to joining Guidehouse, Tanya conducted fraud investigations and forensic accounting as part of another global consulting firm’s dispute advisory services. Prior to this, Tanya was an auditor for a big four accounting firm, where she performed financial statement and internal control audits for a large manufacturing company.
Tanya holds a BA in Criminology and Psychology from Saint Mary’s University, Canada; a JD from Dalhousie University, Canada; and an MBA and MAcc from Mercer University.  She is Certified Public Accountant (CPA), a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE), and a Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist (CAMS).

Paul J. Mahoney is an Assistant Deputy Attorney General in the Office of the New York State Attorney General Letitia James and, under the Director of the New York Medicaid Fraud Control Unit, supervises 50 attorneys and over 200 other staffers investigating and prosecuting criminal and civil fraud and abuse by healthcare providers in the $75 billion-per-year New York Medicaid program. Paul was previously Chief of the Civil Enforcement Division of the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit. He has twice been awarded the Louis J. Lefkowitz Memorial Award for outstanding performance by an assistant attorney general.

From 1997 to 2004, Paul served as an Assistant District Attorney, later Senior Investigative Counsel, in the Frauds Bureau of New York County District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau. His major prosecutions included a seven-month trial of a securities firm and its principals, several other securities fraud operations, and numerous other banking, accounting, and financial fraud investigations and prosecutions.

Before joining the District Attorney’s Office, Paul Mahoney was a litigation associate for seven years at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison in New York City with extensive experience in securities litigation, advertising and unfair trade practices, and products liability, and was recognized for pro bono work by the Legal Aid Society.

Paul Mahoney is a graduate of Cornell Law School and Williams College.

Edward McCabe is an active information security professional. An active practitioner, mentor, and instructor with over 30 years’ experience with Fortune 100 companies, various domestic state, federal and foreign government agencies. Industries supported include Financial Services, Defense Industrial Base, Retail, Electric Power Transmission & Distribution, Hospitality, Legal Services, Payment Processing, Health Care, Construction, Insurance, Technology, Aviation, and Media. Edward is often invited to present and speak on a variety of topics including Social Engineering, Incident Response & Digital Forensics, Threat Intelligence Analysis & Management, Practical Security Data Visualization, Advanced Attack & Penetration Testing, IT Audit Development, Enterprise Governance & Risk Management, and Adopting Information Security as part of Corporate Culture.

Venues have included: the ISACA Computer Audit, Control and Security (CACS) Summit, ISACA Cyber Security Nexus (CSX), ISACA Atlanta Geek Week, Central Ohio Information Security Summit, various Security BSides, (ISC)2 eSymposiums, the Health Information Management Summit, Data Management (DAMA) International, CircleCityCon, and DerbyCon. Edward receives invitations to speak with specific industries and organizations around the globe. A veteran of the United States Navy, Edward holds various ISACA certifications, including the Governance of Enterprise Information Technology (CGEIT), Risk and Information Systems Controls (CRISC), Information Security Manager CISM), Data Privacy Solutions Engineer (CDPSE) and COBIT, in addition to being an ISO/IEC 27001 Lead Implementer, SABSA/Business Security Architect, and a recovering Qualified Security Assessor (PCI QSA).

Edward is an accredited ISACA instructor for the CISM, CRISC, CGEIT and COBIT certification paths, as well as co-authoring the Body of Knowledge Review Manuals for the CGEIT, CRISC and CISM certifications and lead on ISACA’s Ransomware Readiness Audit Program. Additionally Edward develops and delivers custom trainings on a wide range of courses from Analysis of Competing Hypotheses to Zero Trust (one could say topics range from A to Z ) Edward is a seasoned management consultant who is focused on providing risk driven security solutions, with the goal of addressing core business needs relating to governance, risk and compliance requirements while striving to reduce overspending on the technology used to meet those objectives. Edward is responsible for the delivery of a variety of business and technology information security services. Edward’s specialties include enterprise Governance, Risk Management, Compliance, Incident Response, Threat Intelligence Program Management, and Advanced Adversarial Attack & Penetration Testing.

Scott Nemeroff is an Executive Director in EY’s Forensic and Integrity Services practice. He serves on the practices Government and Public Sector Leadership team as the Federal Government Sector Leader. He is responsible for bringing the full suite of Forensic and Integrity service offerings to Public Sector clients.

Scott has more than 15 years of experience fighting fraud and public corruption. He specializes in conducting investigations in to matters of fraud, waste and abuse and developing corrective action plans to enhance his client’s ability prevent similar matters in the future. Scott has built on his investigations experience by developing innovative methods to proactively prevent and detect fraud and corruption risk before a crisis arises for his clients.

During his career, Scott has been involved in more than 70 forensic accounting investigations which included some the world’s most well-known acts of fraud in modern times and several of the largest regulatory fines on record. Prior to joining EY, Scott spent 12 years at another global accounting and consulting firm where he led a practice focused on Anti-bribery/Anti-corruption and white-collar crime investigations.

Scott holds a BS in Finance, Insurance and Business Law from Virginia Tech. He is active member of the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners and Institute of Internal Auditors. He also serves the Washington D.C. Community as a Board Member of DC Legal Aid.

James Ruotolo is a Director in the Financial Crimes, Fraud, and Investigative Services practice at Guidehouse. James is a leader and subject matter expert on engagements with a variety of government agencies and commercial clients. Prior to joining the consulting industry, James was a Senior Director of Product Management and Product Marketing in the Fraud and Security Intelligence Division at SAS, where he managed a global portfolio of products for fraud detection, AML compliance, intelligence management, and cybersecurity primarily in the banking, insurance, government, and healthcare industries. 

James has dedicated his entire career to fraud investigation. He held several leadership roles in investigations and intelligence operations at a large US insurance and financial services company. Earlier in his career, James served as a Product and Markets Manager with the Fraud Solutions Group for a large data aggregator.

James holds a Master’s degree in Economic Crime Management, a Bachelor’s degree in Criminal Justice and has taught graduate courses as an adjunct faculty member of the Utica University Fraud Management MBA program. James serves on the board of directors for the non-profit Identity Theft Resource Center. He is the co-inventor of two patented fraud detection models, a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE), and a frequent author and speaker on fraud analytics technology and fraud risk management with presentations in more than a dozen countries.
 

Abby is a Senior Associate on the Innovative Growth Solutions Team, a division of Grant Thornton’s National Office. As a member of the Audit Innovation team, Abby utilizes her audit experience to support automations and data analytic tools that help improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the firm’s public audit engagements.

Abby participated in two summer Audit Internships with Grant Thornton prior to beginning full-time with the firm following graduation from Bentley University. Abby began her career as a member of the firm’s audit practice, primarily focusing on the manufacturing industry for public and private audits. Abby gained significant experience coordinating and supervising substantive and internal control test procedures with a focus on the inventory cycles. Abby transitioned to the Innovative Growth Solutions team in January 2023.

Caren Shiozaki is a partner with Fortium Partners, the leading provider of C-Suite technology leadership. With 18 years experience in C-Suite roles for Fortune 1000 companies, she brings her expertise in CIO, CISO, COO and board advisory roles to Fortium’s clients.

As an experienced advisor, Caren establishes governance programs for clients; assesses their digital risk profiles and develops mitigation plans; and provides board/C-Suite guidance on ESG strategies and operations. She’s led litigation support initiatives, performed forensic data analysis and has been called upon to provide expert witness testimony. She organized and led crisis risk management teams for several organizations in response to the global pandemic and developed post-pandemic emergence plans.

Caren has served as an advisor to venture capital groups, and served on the board of a startup technology company.

Caren holds a Bachelor of Arts in Genetics from the University of California, Berkeley. A Certified e-Discovery Professional (ACEDS), she also holds professional certifications in the Governance of Enterprise Information Technology and Data Privacy Solutions Engineering (ISACA), and in business ethics and compliance (ECI). Caren served as a Senior Research Fellow at DivIHN Integration, where she provided expertise on digital risk strategy, cyber security, M&A due diligence, and business ethics.

Matt is a Senior Manager in the Audit Methodology and Standards Group, where he works as a member of the firm’s Audit Innovation team on the development and implementation of automations and analytics for use on external audit engagements. Matt also assists with Grant Thornton’s participation on various external task forces focused on the use of technology and innovation by public accounting firms.

Matt joined Grant Thornton immediately after graduating from Villlanova University, and over the first six years of his career participated on audits of accelerated SEC filers, non-accelerated SEC filers, and private companies, with a concentration in manufacturing and consumer & industrial clientele. In particular, Matt developed expertise in processes and controls relating to inventory and cost accounting. For the past four years, Matt has helped to lead implementation of firm-wide audit tools including ideation, user acceptance testing, developing documentation and processes, and direct support of end users post launch. He has also developed various automations and analytics utilizing regression and other statistical approaches.

Pamela Van Dort currently serves as Senior Advisor to the Assistant Inspector General for Investigation at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Office of Inspector General. In this role, she advises the Office of Investigation on strategy, operations, policy development, training, and a variety of special projects. She previously served as the Director of Grant Oversight Strategy at HUD OIG, where she worked closely with audits, investigations, and evaluations as well as other stakeholders to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of HUD OIG’s grant oversight work. She regularly presents to the federal grantee community, government agencies, and other stakeholders on best practices, red flags, and proactive investigations. Pamela co-facilitates the interagency Grant Fraud Working Group, which is chaired by Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz.

Prior to joining HUD OIG, Pamela served as a Senior Investigative Attorney at the National Science Foundation, Office of Inspector General, Office of Investigations where she spent more than a decade working collaboratively with special agents, prosecutors, and forensic auditors to investigate allegations of civil, criminal, and administrative fraud, waste, and abuse related to NSF and other federal programs. She has been recognized by the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency (CIGIE) and multiple U.S. Attorney’s Offices for outstanding work on civil and criminal prosecutions.

Previously, Pamela spent time in private practice focused on complex business litigation. She received her Juris Doctor degree from The George Washington University Law School and a Bachelor of Arts degree from Hope College in Michigan. She is a Certified Fraud Examiner.

Leonard W. Vona is the CEO of Fraud Auditing. He is a forensic accountant with more than 40 years of diversified auditing and forensic accounting experience, including a distinguished 18-year private industry career.  His firm advises clients in areas of litigation support, fraud risk, fraud data analytics and fraud auditing.

Mr. Vona is the author of three books published by Wiley, Fraud Risk Assessment: Building a Fraud Audit Program and The Fraud Audit: Responding to the Risk of Fraud in Core Business Systems, Fraud Data Analytics Methodology: The Fraud Scenario Approach to Uncovering Fraud. Wiley has referred to Mr. Vona as a worldwide renowned authority on internal fraud risk. Mr. Vona lectures nationally and internationally on fraud risk assessments, fraud investigation, fraud prevention and detection, and fraud schemes perpetrated on companies. Mr. Vona has provided more than 1,000 days of fraud training to organizations around the world.