Duncan Levin

Duncan Levin is a nationally recognized expert in asset forfeiture, money laundering, and financial crime. He is Managing Partner of Levin & Associates, PLLC, a New York–based law firm focused on complex criminal, regulatory, and financial matters. He is also a Lecturer on Law at Harvard Law School, where he teaches asset forfeiture and money laundering, as well as trial advocacy.

Before entering private practice, Levin served as both a state and federal prosecutor. He began his career at the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and later served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Eastern District of New York, where he worked in the Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Section. He subsequently returned to the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office as Chief of Asset Forfeiture, where he supervised asset forfeiture and money laundering matters officewide and worked on major international forfeiture and sanctions-related cases involving HSBC, Standard Chartered, and BNP Paribas. He also helped draft New York State laws relating to forfeiture, restitution, and proceeds tracing, and worked closely with regulators and enforcement authorities on matters involving the Bank Secrecy Act, the USA PATRIOT Act, Title 31, and OFAC sanctions programs.

In private practice, Levin represents individuals, companies, financial institutions, hedge funds, and private equity firms in complex criminal, regulatory, and financial matters. His work includes white-collar defense, anti-money laundering (AML) and OFAC counseling, asset tracing, financial investigations, compliance advisory work, and matters involving parallel criminal, civil, and regulatory exposure.

Levin’s teaching and scholarship focus on the intersection of criminal law, constitutional law, and financial enforcement. His recent scholarship includes “When Money Becomes Punishment,” published in the Yale Journal on Regulation, which examines the constitutional significance of monetary sanctions, and “Justices’ Geofence Ruling May Test 4th Amendment’s Future,” published in Law360, which analyzes the Supreme Court’s consideration of geofence warrants and reverse-search surveillance under the Fourth Amendment. He is also a frequent commentator on criminal law and white-collar enforcement, and has appeared in outlets including MSNBC, CNN, NBC, and NY1.

A graduate of Yale College and Yale Law School, Levin clerked for the Honorable Nicholas G. Garaufis of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York. At Yale Law School, he served as a Senior Editor of the Yale Journal on Regulation. He is also a member of the Board of Directors of Housing Works.