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SEC v. Walter C. Little and Andrew M. Berke (insider trading, 2019)

Judgment entered

Checked against the primary document on October 3, 2026. The library's summary, tags and figures for this record were compared with the regulator's own document by an AI model (Claude) following written instructions, with sampled and disputed records read a second time. No lawyer has reviewed them. A checked record can still contain errors, and checked does not mean endorsed. See how we check records or report a correction.

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In February 2019 a court entered consent judgments against former law firm partner Walter Little and his neighbor Andrew Berke. Little's $452,998 and Berke's $555,269 disgorgement were deemed satisfied by criminal forfeiture, in Berke's case together with a payment to the SEC. Little was sentenced to 27 months.

The record

Structured fields for this action, as recorded in our case library.
Agency SEC
Release number LR-24409
Date filed 2019-02-22
Date resolved 2019-02-22
Status judgment
Criminal parallel Yes: sentenced (Little (Berke: time served and supervised release)), 2018-02-22
Sentence 2y 3m
Defendants Walter C. Little (individual) ; Andrew M. Berke (individual)
Cited as charged or alleged Exchange Act s.10(b) and Rule 10b-5 ; Exchange Act s.14(e) and Rule 14e-3 ; Securities Act s.17(a) (statutes and rules cited in the document; not a finding that they were violated)
Techniques Insider trading

What was ordered

Civil penalty
—
Disgorgement
$1m
Prejudgment interest
—
Total relief
$1m
Alleged gain
—

A dash means the release did not state a figure we could extract, not that the figure is zero. Penalty and disgorgement are stored separately so aggregates across the library do not double-count the same dollars.

What is alleged to have happened

The judgments, entered February 14 and 22, 2019, enjoin both men under Sections 10(b) and 14(e) and Section 17(a). Both had pleaded guilty. Berke was sentenced to time served and three years of supervised release. The stored disgorgement is the sum of the two obligations.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with one technique in our taxonomy. The tagging is ours: regulators charge statutory provisions, not technique names, so the mapping is an editorial judgement described in our editorial policy.

Timeline

  1. 2019-02-22 Litigation release published

Primary documents

Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.

The linked release is a work of the United States government and is not subject to copyright. Our summary and narrative above are our own writing.

Same matter

The library links these 2 records because they appear to concern one matter: the same lead defendant, an overlapping technique tag and close filing dates, or a shared court docket or a release that cites the other. Records are listed by date filed.

Date filed Agency Record Status
2017-05-11 SEC SEC v. Walter C. Little and Andrew M. Berke (insider trading, 2017) Settled
2019-02-22 SEC SEC v. Walter C. Little and Andrew M. Berke (insider trading, 2019)(this record) Judgment entered

This grouping is the library's, made by matching names, techniques, dates and citations when the site is built. It is not the regulator's or a court's determination that the records are one case, and it errs towards missing a link rather than making a false one.

Other actions in the library sharing at least one technique tag with this one.

Action Agency Filed Technique Penalty Status
SEC v. Trijya Vakil and Neeraj Visen (insider trading, 2026) SEC 2026-09-04 Insider Trading $109k settled
CFTC v. Gabriel Perez (insider trading, 2026) CFTC 2026-08-28 Insider Trading $65k judgment
SEC v. Gavin Wolfe and others (insider trading, 2026) SEC 2026-08-21 Insider Trading — filed
SEC v. Jesse R. Mitchell (insider trading, 2026) SEC 2026-08-21 Insider Trading — filed
SEBI v. Arun Kumar Somani and others (insider trading review, Indian Oil Corporation, 2026) SEBI (India) 2026-08-13 Insider Trading — dismissed
SEC v. Benjamin Tesfaye (insider trading, 2026) SEC 2026-08-11 Insider Trading $18.7k settled

Record added September 10, 2026. submit a correction.