Maraya Best specializes in representing whistleblowers under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, the Commodity Exchange Act, the Dodd-Frank Act, the IRS whistleblower law, and the False Claims Act. She has a special expertise in representing international whistleblowers. She has worked closely with whistleblowers and the investigating federal agencies in disclosing illegal activities that have occurred in numerous foreign countries.
Although almost all of her clients are anonymous and confidential, she assisted in the successful representation of Alex Chepurko, who obtained a judgment on behalf of the United States for $69.6 million in a False Claims Act qui tam lawsuit. Maraya has also provided highly effective assistance in the representation of Howard Wilkinson in his historic money laundering case.
Maraya received her JD from Northeastern University School of Law in 2018 and began her career at Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto as the 2018 recipient of the highly prestigious and competitive Estelle S. Kohn Memorial Fellowship awarded by Northeastern University School of Law. She went on to worked at KKC for several years as an Associate Attorney.
After serving as an attorney with the United States Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division for five years, where she assisted in the prosecution of hate crimes and law enforcement misconduct; led investigations of civil rights cold cases; and directed the implementation of a civil rights records act, Maraya has returned to KKC as a Partner.
Promoting International Qui Tam Whistleblowing
Kohn, Kohn and Colapinto has played an instrumental role in advancing whistleblower rights worldwide. Currently the partners represent whistleblowers from every continent on earth (except Antarctica) in pursuing whistleblower reward cases under U.S. laws.
Steve Kohn has been sponsored by the U.S. Department of State to promote whistleblowing on a world-wide scale, including special seminars and programs in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Bosnia, Serbia and Thailand. He has given major keynote addresses in Peru and Greece and presented in numerous international conferences and has testified on behalf of whistleblowers before the European Parliament and the Danish Parliament. Mike Kohn has made major international presentations in Poland, South Korea and Israel. The firm filed extensive comments supporting greater whistleblower protections in the now-approved European Directive on Whistleblowing.
Whistleblower attorney Stephen M. Kohn and partners of Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto regularly advise congress on crafting whistleblower laws. And play an instrumental role in drafting whistleblower protection laws, such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX), The Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act, and the Dodd-Frank Act.
SEC & IRS Rulemaking
During the Dodd-Frank rulemaking process, our partners worked closely with the SEC to create an effective whistleblower program. Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto’s partners met personally with each of the five SEC Commissioners. They presented them with detailed reports and proposals setting forth rules that were essential to make the law work for Dodd-Frank whistleblowers as intended by Congress. Furthermore, Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto’s whistleblower attorneys seek to protect and enhance legal protections for tax fraud whistleblowers. Our firm has filed numerous internal revenue service rulemaking petitions, filed extensive briefs to the IRS and testified at IRS rulemaking hearsing to strengthen the tax whistleblower program.
In recognition of the growing importance of whistleblower litigation, The National Law Journal named the whistleblower attorney and advocacy law firm of Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto as one of top fifty plaintiff’s law firms in the United States. The firm’s partners were officially named as among “America’s Elite Trial Lawyers.” In its September 29, 2014 article, “Elite Trial Lawyers: The 50 Leading Plaintiff’s Firms in America,” the National Law Journal named Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto as one of the firm’s “doing the most creative and most important work in the courtroom.”
- 2013-2020 – A-V Preeminent, Martindale-Hubbell®
- 2014 – “Elite Trial Lawyers” Designation, National Law Journal (Awarded to KKC LLP)
- 2014 – America’s Most Honored Professionals, American Registry (Awarded to KKC LLP)
- 2009 – Top Attorneys, Washington DC Super Lawyers (Awarded to KKC LLP)
- 2008 – Friend of the IEEE Award
- 2003 – “Hot List” of Plantiff’s Law Firms, National Law Journal
Read Maraya’s Publications at:
What Clients are Saying
“When you’re in danger, you need someone you can trust, who isn’t afraid, and who knows how to fight. KKC always has my back.”
“Most law firms it really is all about billable hours. For these guys it’s all about the justice.”
“Thanks [KKC] from the bottom of my heart. I think if you ever have a whistleblowing claim they are the folks to take care of it for you.”
“In my world, courage is spelled KKC. They go up against the most powerful adversaries and win.”
Maraya’s Latest Thinking
Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto, LLP and European Civil Society Organizations Dedicated to Whistleblower Rights Provide Recommendations for Ireland’s New Whistleblower Law
Today, the international whistleblower law firm Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto, LLP along with the National Whistleblower Center, Whistleblowing International, and the European Center for Whistleblower Rights, filed a public comment with the Irish Government’s Department of Public Expenditure and Reform providing the Government of Ireland specific recommendations for the new whistleblower legislation Ireland is in the process of drafting to fulfill the requirements of the Directive (EU) 2019/1937 on the Protection of Persons who report Breaches of Union Law, passed this year. Based on an expert review by Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto attorneys, the best practices outlined in this letter include: Expanding whistleblower protections to cover disclosures permitted under international anti-corruption conventions signed by Member States; Adopting language and procedures that have proven effective in protecting whistleblowers when implementing Articles 6-7, 11, 14-16, 19-21, and 23-24 of the Directive; Narrowly interpreting Article 22 of the Directive in order to ensure ...
Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto, LLP Joins the International Community in Calling for Police Accountability
Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto, LLP joins the families of victims, academics, and other civil society organizations such as the US Human Rights Network in sending a letter to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights regarding the implementation of the recent Human Rights Council Resolution (A/HRC/43/L.50) adopted on June 19, 2020. In this letter, the UN High Commissioner is urged to center her report on the lived experiences of people of African descent and be informed primarily by individuals and communities directly impacted by structural racism and police violence and examine the government responses to antiracism protests, including the alleged use of excessive force against protesters, bystanders and journalists through on the ground consultations. As whistleblower advocates, the attorneys at Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto consider themselves to be vanguards of protected speech and personally know how necessary it is to get first person information to uncover the depth of corruption and abuse. In ...
The World Bank Should Create and Recommend Whistleblower Protections to Ensure Integrity in Governments’ Responses to the COVID-19 Epidemic
The World Bank has released a report and webinar on the unique opportunities for corruption that have arisen as nations respond to the COVID-19 epidemic. According to the World Bank, such particularized corruption, which can already be seen in the United States and around the world, can be broken into four broad categories: Corruption in the procurement of emergency supplies and services (including fraud); Corruption in the delivery of emergency services and supplies (which may include diversion to political elites and those with affluence); Corruption in the administration of the emergency response (such as filling emergency response jobs with unqualified but well-connected persons); and Adoption and/or application of emergency powers to suit interest groups, or to use weakened government oversight for unrelated agendas. To address such issues the World Bank included recommendations in its report to stop these particular types of corruptions such as: establishing explicit record keeping rules and ...
Our Client Received the Largest Whistleblower Reward in World History of $104 Million
Bradley Birkenfeld broke the back of Swiss bank secrecy. He was the first Swiss banker to file a case under the IRS whistleblower law. The results were unprecedented. UBS bank (at the time the largest bank in the world) had to pay a fine of $780 million. They also had to close all known U.S. accounts, and for the first time in history, the bank turned over the names of 4450 U.S. taxpayers for prosecution in the United States. Mr. Birkenfeld obtained the largest ever individual qui tam whistleblower award in history, $104 million.
Pro Bono Public Service
Dedicated to protecting whistleblowers, the National Whistleblower Center (NWC) was founded in 1988 by three experienced whistleblower-rights attorneys, Stephen M. Kohn, Michael D. Kohn and David K. Colapinto. Mary Jane was selected as the NWC’s first Public Interest Law Fellow, and soon became a major leader in the NWC. She currently is the NWC corporate Treasure and serves on its Board of Directors. She founded the whistleblower protection blog, and for years managed many of the NWC’s highly successful programs.