Genevieve H. Dame, Esq.
Dame Law, P.C. , Dunwoody, GA

Explore the underlying motives that drive management to manipulate financial statements and how these schemes are carried out and concealed. This session will walk through real-world examples and red flags, helping CPAs and forensic professionals better detect, investigate, and prevent financial statement fraud from the top down.

Karen B. Fortune, CPA, CFF, CGMA, MAcc
Managing Partner / IAG Forensics & Valuation , Atlanta, GA

Paul D. Dopp, CPA, CVA, CFE
Senior Managing Director / B. Riley Advisory Services , Atlanta, GA

Matthew B. Ames, J.D.
Balch & Bingham LLP , Atlanta, GA

Jeff Reilly, J.D.
Rozen, Rozen & Reilly , Marietta, GA

This panel of litigators and forensic accountants will discuss why some cases that really should settle end up going to court. Once that happens, how do you best get your points across? The panel will share how to best present your case, in a limited period of time, to a potentially disinterested and/or uninformed audience. Learn about the differences between presenting to a judge and a jury and how to adjust to opposing counsel’s cross examination techniques in front of either fact-finder.

Dan Branch, CPA, ABV, ASA, MBA
Partner / IAG Forensics & Valuation , Atlanta, GA

Economic damages require complex analysis to determine the financial compensation owed to the damaged entity.  In an effort to “make the entity whole”, practitioners employ various tools and techniques derived from business valuation theory.  We will discuss several aspects of economic damages and the types of damage measurements, as well as common weaknesses in expert analyses. For the more senior attendees, bring your personal experiences; for newer professionals, get ready to learn some tricks of the trade!

Natalie S. Lewis, CPA, CGMA, CFE, CFF
Senior Vice President / J.S. Held , Alpharetta, GA

Are you an online sleuth? Are you adept at finding that hidden gem buried in a sea of ever-increasing online information? You can be with open-source intelligence (OSINT). This session will show you how to integrate OSINT into your fraud investigation to gain insight into a suspect’s affiliations and relationships to help trace misappropriated funds. Through the use of real-world stories, we’ll explore how public information can expand your investigation and aid in interviews.

Theodore H. Brown, CPA
IDiscovery Solutions, Inc. , Washington, DC

Artificial intelligence is changing the landscape of fraud detection and forensic accounting. This session will explore how AI-generated content — especially deepfakes and shallow fakes — can be used to mislead, manipulate financial evidence or support fraudulent schemes. Attendees will learn how to identify these threats and adapt investigative techniques to stay ahead of emerging AI-driven risks.

Toby Groves, Ph.D.
Groves Research and Consulting , Cincinnati, OH

To improve ethical behavior, we build ethics codes, conduct ethics training and emphasize an ethical “tone at the top.”  Research shows, though, that these traditional initiatives too often harm ethical reasoning more than they help. We inaccurately predict how people will respond to behavioral initiatives and teach ethics using ineffective approaches. This class explains what actually works in the real world and what doesn’t. Learn why we make choices that contradict our own ethical beliefs and why we falsely recollect our decisions as being ethical when they were not. Attendees will be able to apply new knowledge to improve future ethical behavior at the individual and organizational levels.