Former Assistant U.S. Attorney Kenneth R. Chadwell recently joined Plunkett Cooney, one of the Midwest’s oldest and most accomplished full-service law firms, to establish a White-collar Criminal Defense & Corporate Investigations Practice Group.
An of counsel member of the firm’s Detroit office, Chadwell worked for nearly 40 years in the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) as well as in private practice. His practice focuses on white-collar and corporate criminal defense cases, internal corporate investigations, federal grand jury investigations, and institutional and business compliance matters.
Chadwell, who served as the DOJ’s Deputy Chief of National Security, conducted hundreds of grand jury investigations, supervised numerous federal agents involving virtually every type of federal criminal offense, oversaw wiretap and other sensitive investigative techniques, tried approximately 50 cases before federal juries as sole or lead counsel, and appeared as lead counsel before the U.S. Court of Appeals in more than 80 appeals.
In addition, Chadwell was one of five elite federal litigators hand-picked to be a counter-terrorism prosecutor following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, has experience with U.S. and foreign intelligence agencies and litigating cases involving classified material, and has held a top secret security clearance for decades.
Admitted to practice in state and federal courts in Michigan and the District of Columbia, as well as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, Chadwell has also appeared pro hac vice in state courts in Nevada and Pennsylvania. He is a member of the State Bar of Michigan and Federalist Society. Chadwell is a 1986 magna cum laude graduate of Wayne State University Law School, where he was member of the Law Review and was admitted to the Order of the Coif. He received his undergraduate degree from Cedarville College in 1983.
