Adani case was a name-and-shame indictment by Biden administration without realistic prospect of trial: US DOJ to Court

The United States Department of Justice has told a federal court that the criminal case against Gautam Adani and others was a “name and shame” indictment brought without any realistic prospect of a trial.

In a July 4 filing before Judge Nicholas G Garaufis US District Court for the Eastern District of New York, the DOJ defended its decision to seek dismissal with prejudice of all charges in United States v Gautam S Adani and others.

The response said "The indictment was unsealed in the final days of the prior Administration, apparently as a “name and shame” designed to levy accusations without any realistic prospect of a trial ever occurring. Department leadership at the time was surely aware they were dropping a potential quagmire of a case into the lap of the incoming Administration, and perhaps that was an intentional choice."

The filing was made after the Judge asked the DOJ to explain why it sought dismissal of the case. The court had earlier described the DOJ’s dismissal motion as “terse, bland, and conclusory.”

Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General R Trent McCotter, who signed the filing, said the decision to drop the charges was taken after meetings with defence counsel, internal DOJ discussions, review of hundreds of pages of material and independent legal analysis.

“The decision to seek dismissal was not a close call.”

The DOJ said the indictment was unsealed in the final days of the previous administration, apparently as a “name and shame” exercise designed to make allegations without any realistic prospect of trial.

It said the case was overwhelmingly foreign in character. According to the DOJ, the allegations concerned Indian nationals allegedly trying to bribe other Indian nationals through Indian rebate programmes for Indian contracts to supply Indian electricity in India.

It said “The United States pretending to be the world police can cause diplomatic strife and also wastes resources better spent on domestic concerns. India can better manage its internal systems than can prosecutors in Brooklyn and Washington.”

The department also said India had examined many of the allegations and, in reports and decisions issued in 2026, found no actionable misconduct.

The DOJ listed several reasons for dropping the case. It said no investor had lost any money on the securities at issue. Two notes had been fully repaid, and the other two were current.

It further said there were serious proof problems since significant evidence and key witnesses were in India. The defendants had never appeared in the case and probably never would, the DOJ added, since they are foreign nationals living abroad in locations where there was no reasonable prospect of arrest.

On the securities charges against Gautam Adani, Sagar Adani and Vneet Jaain, the DOJ was particularly sharp.

“The securities charges should never have been brought.”

The department said the securities charges were failed Foreign Corrupt Practices Act claims that had been recast as securities charges. It said the alleged conduct took place almost entirely in India and raised serious jurisdictional concerns under US securities law.

The DOJ also said the alleged false statements were largely general statements about legal compliance, reputation and integrity. Such statements, it said, have been treated by US courts as non-actionable puffery in securities cases.

On the FCPA charges against the other defendants, the DOJ said they did not satisfy the department’s own enforcement policy under the Blanche Memorandum. That policy requires FCPA prosecutions to focus on conduct that directly undermines US national interests.

The DOJ said the alleged conduct did not involve criminal organisations, did not affect US companies, did not implicate national security, was not egregious and had already been investigated in India.

It also rejected media reports suggesting that the dismissal was linked to any promise of investment in the United States.

It said "The current or former Department attorneys who unethically fed those stories have suggested that I sought dismissal of the securities charges at least in part because of some promise by those defendants to invest money in the United States. That is false."

The DOJ said it had already decided to seek dismissal of the securities charges before any such topic arose.

The filing also pushed back against judicial scrutiny of prosecutorial decisions to drop charges. It said forcing the DOJ to explain internal reasons for dismissal could chill future dismissals, expose privileged deliberations and raise separation of powers concerns.

The DOJ said there was nothing improper in its original dismissal motion and urged the court to allow the case to be closed.

It said the defendants had remained in limbo for six weeks on charges that should have been dropped a year ago or never brought in the first place.

The indictment had alleged that Gautam Adani, Sagar Adani, Vneet Jaain, Ranjit Gupta and others devised a plan to bribe Indian state government officials to get the project going. It was alleged that bribes worth ₹2,029 crore (around $265 million) were promised to officials of state electricity distribution companies. Of this, ₹1,750 crore was allegedly allocated to officials in Andhra Pradesh to secure purchase of 7 gigawatts of solar power.

Gautam Adani, Sagar Adani, and Vneet Jaain are represented in the proceedings by Sullivan & Cromwell LLP co-chair Robert J Giuffra Jr and partner James McDonald. Incidentally, Robert Giuffra happens to be US President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer.

The other lawyers who represented Adani are Timothy Sini (Nixon Peabody) and Andrey Spektor (Norton Rose Fulbright).

Ranjit Gupta was represented by Paul Schoeman of HSF Kramer (New York).

Cyril Cabanes was represented by Stephen Best from Brown Rudnick (Washington, DC).

Saurabh Agarwal was represented by Winston Paes of Debevoise & Plimpton (New York).

Deepak Malhotra was represented by Aditya Singh (Singapore) and Michael Kendall (Boston) of White & Case.

Rupesh Agarwal was represented by Iris Bennett and Patrick Linehan of Steptoe (Washington, DC).