Katya Gozias (Chair) is a seasoned international investigative, business intelligence and risk mitigation professional with over 16 years of experience advising law firms and multinational corporations. She expertly consults on problems involving integrity and reputational risks and has led multi-disciplinary teams on investigations ranging from internal fraud to complex multi-jurisdictional asset searches.

Ms. Gozias has unique expertise in the emerging area of blockchain applications. She works with blockchain companies to develop a roadmap and framework for the addition of fully operable blockchain technology solutions for enterprise clients, to include configuration for KYC, cyber security, anti-fraud, and supply chain tracking.

She has also conducted AML reviews for money service businesses, payment processors, credit unions, and insurance companies, as well as advised on due diligence and compliance with FinCen guidelines. Ms. Gozias has broad experience designing rigorous compliance programs, policies and procedures, uncovering gaps, and ameliorating breaches of regulations. She has crafted, reviewed, and implemented U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) programs and assisted with bank monitorships and lookback investigations.

Before joining Guidepost, Ms. Gozias was managing director at an international consulting company, and prior to that worked as a senior consultant in corporate investigations at a global risk consultancy. Ms. Gozias has been a speaker or moderator at various industry associations and has authored white papers and articles ranging from AML compliance, anti-bribery, and corruption to best practices for conducting interviews in remote investigations.

In addition to her Juris Doctorate, Ms. Gozias earned a certificate in blockchain technologies from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She speaks fluent Russian, intermediate Japanese, and basic Mandarin and Spanish.

Kathy Bazoian Phelps (Programming Director) has been a lawyer since 1991 and is currently a partner at Raines Feldman LLP in the Los Angeles office. In addition to individually serving as a fiduciary in certain matters, Kathy practices in the area of insolvency law, fiduciary representation, and fraud litigation, where she represents federal equity and state court receivers and bankruptcy trustees. Kathy frequently serves as special litigation counsel for fiduciaries and interested parties in fraud-related litigation, cases arising out of receivership and bankruptcy as well as parallel criminal and civil forfeiture proceedings. She is particularly knowledgeable about the administration of Ponzi scheme cases and has extensive litigation experience in claims arising in these types of cases.

Kathy has lectured widely and written on bankruptcy and receivership matters, with a focus on Ponzi schemes. Her book entitled The Ponzi Book: A Legal Resource for Unraveling Ponzi Schemes, co-authored with Hon. Steven Rhodes, has garnered national and international attention as the authoritative work on Ponzi scheme law. In addition to her roles as lawyer, speaker and author, Kathy also serves as a mediator and is currently on the mediation and arbitration rosters for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, as well as the Bankruptcy Mediation Panel for the Central District of California and the Bankruptcy Mediation Panel for the District of Arizona.

Asha Muldro (Programming Director) is a senior managing director and co-leader of the Los Angeles office of Guidepost Solutions, Asha Muldro directs an array of compliance, monitoring, and investigative matters for corporations and individuals. In addition, as a deputy general counsel, Ms. Muldro assists with legal and compliance matters for the firm’s worldwide offices. A seasoned former federal prosecutor, Ms. Muldro brings more than 25 years of experience combined with personalized service and unwavering dedication to every client.

Ms. Muldro leads the Guidepost Solutions team assisting the University of Michigan with implementing recommended remediation efforts in the aftermath of sexual misconduct findings against a former Provost. She and the team are working collaboratively with the University’s stakeholders to create a more dynamic program and to promote a culture of safety and inclusion. She is also currently leading the resident engagement compliance assessment for the federal monitorship of the New York City Housing Authority. Ms. Muldro recently led the compliance program assessment for the federal monitorship of General Motors.

Ms. Muldro leads compliance and investigative matters for a range of sectors. She lectures on compliance, sexual harassment, race discrimination, data privacy, CCPA and GDPR regulations, international supply chain, export controls, cybersecurity, and investigative techniques. Ms. Muldro is also a founding member and leader on the firm’s Diversity & Inclusion Committee. She also serves on the Board of Directors for the Columbia Law School Association.

Ms. Muldro served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Central District of California for seven years. As a prosecutor, she directed federal law enforcement agencies in more than 145 criminal investigations, presented numerous cases to the grand jury, served as lead trial counsel on multiple bench and jury trials, and briefed and argued several appeals before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Ms. Muldro also assisted in the exchange of information with foreign countries and prosecuted cases involving government fraud, public corruption, bank fraud, money laundering, violent and organized crime, human trafficking, sex crimes, immigration crimes, domestic security, and cybersecurity.

Previously, Ms. Muldro was a partner at an elite litigation boutique, Willenken LLP where she led white collar investigations and complex civil litigation cases. Her clients included Microsoft, GoPro, KeyBank, Staples, and Southern California Gas & Electric.

Prior to joining the U.S. Department of Justice, Ms. Muldro spent five years practicing law at Latham & Watkins LLP in its White-Collar Defense and Investigations group. As the senior associate on a wide range of complex commercial litigation matters and internal investigations, she represented Tenet Healthcare and other Fortune 500 companies. She also represented corporate officers and directors against the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.S. Department of Justice. Ms. Muldro also worked for the U.S. House of Representatives and J.P. Morgan Chase. She clerked for U.S. District Judge Robert P. Patterson, Jr. in the Southern District of New York. Ms. Muldro is a graduate of Columbia Law School and earned her B.A. at Yale University.

Lieutenant Stephan Margolis (Event Manager) has worked for over 40 years on a broad spectrum of law enforcement issues. Over the last decade his assignment was the Officer-in-Charge of Transnational Organized Crime, Major Crimes Division of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD). In this role he partnered with federal and international agencies to investigate and prosecute global criminal enterprises.

Stephan has also managed the Anti-Terrorism Intelligence Section, Gang Intervention Team (gang and narcotics), Divisional Detectives, Patrol, and Mobile Field Forces. As an officer, detective, and sergeant, he has worked patrol, detectives, homicide, crime analysis, and several other specialized units. Over his career, Stephan co-developed five pilot programs that were recognized as “best practices” and instituted in LAPD.

Since 1985, Stephan has worked in National Security as a federal contractor developing and teaching responses to international terrorism. He has worked over a decade as a principal Subject Matter Expert and trainer for DOE’s Senior Energy Officials responding to radiological/nuclear crises. Lieutenant Margolis developed (for the National Nuclear Security Administration) the Crisis Decision Making (CDM) model to manage critical incidents.

As a California state POST certified Master Instructor, Lieutenant Margolis co-developed and delivered a wide spectrum of training for local, state, and federal law enforcement. He has held a previous appointment as adjunct faculty for California State University, Dominguez Hills, where he taught courses on Systems Theory, Scientific Methodology, and Contemporary Political Issues in the United States.

Sal Randazzo (Event Manager) was appointed as the Deputy Inspector General, Investigations in May 2019 for the Los Angeles Unified School District’s (LAUSD), Office of the Inspector General. He leads a team responsible for investigating allegations of improper or illegal activities by LAUSD employees, contractors or other entities doing business with the LAUSD. His team’s workload consists of proactive projects and investigations designed to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse.

Before taking on his role at the LAUSD, Sal Randazzo had a twenty-eight-year career in the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), most of which was spent here in the Los Angeles area. He held several roles within the FBI, to include Supervisor of the Los Angeles Filed Offices’ Civil Rights squad, and the Assistant Special Agent in Charge over the White-Collar Crime programs.

Becky Yang O'Malley (Membership Director) has 20 years of consulting experience in providing forensic accounting, finance and economic analyses for civil and criminal litigation matters and fraud investigations, including breach of contract, class actions, partnership disputes, fraudulent conveyances, alter-ego issues, and misappropriation of assets. Having been involved in numerous engagements, she is knowledgeable in a wide range of industries including construction, real estate, manufacturing, healthcare, financial institutions, and entertainment.

Becky has extensive experience conducting reactive investigations, proactive compliance engagements, and shadow investigations for public and private companies and not-for-profit entities, involving issues such as allegations of financial fraud, corruption, misappropriation, and employee misconduct. Her experience in this area includes leveraging sophisticated data analytics techniques, such as acquiring, extracting, converting, standardizing, and applying statistical analysis in order to analyze large volumes of accounting data.

Becky is also well-versed in the calculation of economic damages, the preparation of findings reports, and the evaluation of damages claims submitted by opposing counsel. She works directly with counsel to prepare cross examination questions and to develop trial exhibits. Additionally, she assists counsel with discovery, including developing and responding to requests for production and interrogatories, and reviews documents produced by litigators to identify those relevant to a damages opinion.

Prior to joining B. Riley Advisory Services (formerly GlassRatner), Becky has held leadership positions with several national public accounting firms. Becky has also developed and presented various learning events on forensic accounting and fraud issues. She is currently the Vice President of Training and on the Board of Directors of the Los Angeles Chapter of the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners.

Becky graduated from Boston College with a Bachelor of Arts and Sciences degree in English, and a minor in Computer Science.

Miguel Salcedo (Communications Director) is a Director in FTI Consulting’s Global Risk and Investigations Practice, based in Los Angeles, California. Miguel works primarily on complex, multi-jurisdictional due diligence investigations, asset tracing, anti-bribery and corruption reviews, money laundering and terror finance analysis, and business intelligence work for both public- and private-sector clients. Miguel’s work is aimed primarily at helping clients mitigate legal and operational risks, protect corporate assets, navigate hostile/challenging commercial environments, and ensure compliance with economic sanctions regimes and anti-corruption laws.

His operational focus spans numerous domains including tech, energy, Hollywood, cannabis, global sporting, mining, aerospace, sovereign debt arbitration, digital media, private equity, online gaming, adult entertainment, construction, online gaming, agriculture, finance, and maritime. He focuses heavily on Latin America, the Middle East/North Africa, and East Asia, drawing heavily on social media analytics software, open and proprietary public records databases, and human intelligence gathered through onsite data collection and confidential source inquiries.  

Miguel’s experience includes: overseeing multiple workstreams in the monitorship of an international bank sanctioned for AML and terror finance deficiencies; drafting the AML policies and procedures of a payment processor servicing the high-risk adult entertainment industry; carrying out an onsite investigation into an international mining company operating in South America following whistleblower allegations of bribery and corruption; performing a gap analysis into the financial controls of a major cannabis producer with licenses across multiple states; and conducting OSINT research and business intelligence gathering to reveal the financial relationships and potential regulatory/sanctions violations involving a high-profile military contractor with potential links to hostile foreign powers.

Prior to joining FTI, Miguel was an Editor at Control Risks, a political and security risk consultancy, where he was responsible for English-, Spanish- and Portuguese-language editing. While at Control Risks, he participated in investigations focusing on price-fixing, environmental regulation and corruption in Latin America. Prior to Control Risks, Miguel worked as a freelance translator and interpreter and was a teacher in South Korea and Brazil. Miguel has a bachelor’s degree in International Studies from the University of St. Thomas in Houston and a master’s degree in Cognitive Science (with honors) from the University of Barcelona, Spain. He received a State Department scholarship for undergraduate study in Chile and was a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar taking graduate coursework in International Relations at PUC-Rio in Brazil. He is a Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist.

Tiffany Johnston (Communications Director) is the Chief of Staff at BlockCerts Blockchain. She manages the Global Channel Partners located in four continents and eight countries as well as overseeing the operational support for Client Services in North America, Africa, and the Middle East.

Ms. Johnston has been in the blockchain industry for over 4 years and is considered as one of the women pioneers in this space, she has been working with clients in the fintech, mortgage and NFT projects for the betterment of women in India and the US through Web3.0 technologies.

She was a financial advisor, trained in Wall Street and served her clients in San Francisco for over a decade before transitioning into the Tech industry as a Senior Client Services Consultant in the Bay Area.

She consulted SMEs on their corporate transition from traditional telecom systems into a VOIP network infrastructure which involves systems integration in corporate communication and security. She worked with Siemens, Nortel and Cisco in transforming dozens of SMEs from traditional telephone platforms to VOIP, internet-based communication platforms.

Ms. Johnston also served in the US Air Force as a Command-and-Control Specialist in Germany, a subdivision of USAF-European Intelligence for Air Command. She managed the operational support for Top Secret USAF missions in Europe and Africa. She held a Top Secret-SBI clearance while serving in Germany.

Ms. Johnston has a B.A. in Economics & Finance from UC Santa Barbara and a Project Management Certificate from UC San Diego. She is a frequent Guest Lecturer on Blockchain Technology at Nazarene University, San Diego.

Rabia Qureshi (Secretary) is a Director in the Forensic & Litigation Consulting segment at FTI Consulting providing accounting expertise with issues related to litigation, disputes resolution, and financial statement fraud investigations.

Throughout her career, Ms. Qureshi has directed investigations under the Department of Justice (DOJ), the Committee of Foreign Investments in the United States (CFIUS), the Office of Mortgage Settlement Oversight (OMSO), as well as Federal and State Courts. She has assisted counsel with complex and high-profile criminal investigations involving money laundering, tax evasion, international and domestic bank related crimes and other criminal activity where there is a financial nexus or motive.

Prior to joining FTI Consulting, she was in similar roles at accounting firms Grant Thornton and BDO.

Ms. Qureshi holds a M.S in accountancy and a B.B.A in accounting from Baruch College in New York. She is a CPA and CFE and a member of the American Institute of CPAs, the California Society of Certified Public Accountant, the New York State Society of CPAs and the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners.

David Villasenor (Secretary) is a GRC Account Executive for Aston Carter. Aston Carter is the largest GRC Staffing firm in the US, supporting 20 of the top 30 financial institutions in North America. He has been in the staffing industry for 8 years and has expertise in recruiting, retention, businesses development, account management, labor markets, and the labor trends. He successfully built out Aston Carter’s Accounting & Finance San Diego Branch and previously was San Diego Chapter President for IMA (Institute for management Accountants). He is now leading the build out of the Governance, Risk, and Compliance Branch for Southern California.

Jannies Burlingame (Treasurer) most recently served as the Executive Director of Internal Audit for Polaris Pharmaceutical Inc. and played a key role in achieving their Asia IPO by building the risk management framework from the ground up. Her contributions resulted in reaching a successful level of regulatory compliance both domestically and internationally.  

Jannies is also the founder and Principal Consultant of SS&B Global Consulting Corporation, which specializes in delivering business solutions to Fortune 1000 Companies in the areas of risk and audit advisory. Throughout her collective 20+ year tenure in audit which started with PricewaterhouseCoopers, Jannies worked in a variety of industries including Bio-Pharmaceutical, Banking, Tech., Tele-communications, and Entertainment, either as a leader or key member of audit engagement team.

A National James Burn Scholar from the University of Southern California Leventhal School of Accounting, as well as a proud Wolverine from University of Michigan, Ann Arbor Business School, Jannies has a perpetual and insatiable desire for knowledge.

As a trilingual audit professional, Jannies has traveled extensively throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia, spearheading multilingual audits. With 900+ hours of speaking experience, she has trained numerous global corporations on flowcharts, audit methodology, risk management, Sarbanes-Oxley/J-SOX, and Emotional/Cultural Intelligence (EI/CI). She is most passionate about educating her fellow auditors on how to develop their EQ skills to become more valuable team members and leaders in the profession.

Jannies’ dissertation topic is “Communication and Negotiation Tactics in the Virtual Setting.” This topic is a combination of her passion in learning more about EI and applying it to improve communication strategies for business professionals. Her plan is to publish a book on the topic based on her research.

Manny Medrano (Chapter Advisor) is an experienced trial attorney who focuses on white collar criminal defense, financial litigation, and internal investigations. He has defended corporations, senior executives, public officials and private individuals in criminal investigations, regulatory actions, trials, and appeals.

Prior to joining Zuber Lawler & Del Duca, Mr. Medrano served as a federal prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles. He served as Chief of the Asset Forfeiture Section, and Deputy Chief of the Criminal Complaints Unit. During Mr. Medrano’s time as a federal prosecutor, he conducted lengthy grand jury investigations, and prosecuted cases involving complex financial crime and RICO, money laundering, narcotics, government fraud and violent crime. He was recognized for his outstanding government service with numerous awards and commendations from federal investigative agencies, including the DEA, FBI, ATF and IRS, among others. He tried numerous precedent-setting cases as lead prosecutor, including the 1985 kidnapping, torture, and murder of DEA Special Agent Enrique Camarena in Mexico, which was the subject of the Netflix show Narcos Mexico. For his work on that case he received the prestigious Department of Justice Director’s Award for Superior Performance. As a federal prosecutor he tried 60 cases to verdict, never losing a jury trial.

A sought-after speaker, Mr. Medrano served as a Lecturer and Group Leader for the U.S. Attorney General’s Trial Advocacy Program. He is an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Southern California Law School, Loyola Law School, Pepperdine University School of Law, and Southwestern University School of Law, where he has taught Evidence, Trial Advocacy, Ethics and Negotiation. He has also taught as a visiting faculty member at the Harvard Law School’s nationally recognized Trial Advocacy Workshop. Mr. Medrano has lectured at numerous training sessions for state and federal law enforcement officials around the country. He is a featured keynoter and panelist at bar and judicial association conferences on a wide range of legal and media topics. He has served as a Judge Pro Tem in Los Angeles County.

Mr. Medrano is a former member of the prestigious ranks of the U.S. Supreme Court press corps, where he served as a Supreme Court/Legal Affairs correspondent for ABC News in Washington, D.C. He has further distinguished himself as an Emmy award-winning reporter/anchor for KTLA News and KNBC News in Los Angeles. He appears regularly as a legal commentator on network and local television and radio programs, including ABC, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, and NPR. He has been profiled and quoted in numerous publications, including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Los Angeles Daily Journal.

Mr. Medrano understands that even the mere allegation of criminal conduct can be devastating for an individual or business entity. With his journalism background, he is able to provide legal and strategic advice in high-profile matters to protect clients’ interests when they are unwillingly thrust into the public arena.

Mr. Medrano is active in numerous charities. He has received numerous awards and recognition for his work benefiting the community from members of Congress and state legislators, as well as corporations, government agencies, non-profit entities, and universities.