Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison essentially planted its flag in a new practice area with the announcement Friday that it is bringing in as a partner a prominent federal prosecutor described by the Washington Post as the top catch for law firms seeking to attract Foreign Corrupt Practices Act work.

Mark Mendelsohn, who now serves as deputy chief of the fraud section of the Justice Department's criminal division, will begin work June 1 at Paul Weiss. He is, a Paul Weiss press release states, "internationally acknowledged and respected as the architect and key enforcement official of the DOJ's Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) enforcement program."

At Paul Weiss, Mendelsohn will put together a team to represent corporations defending enforcement actions under the federal statute, which targets those who seek to obtain overseas business through bribery. He tells the Post that he will first look to lawyers already at Paul Weiss for his FCPA tream, but will then look to hire outside the firm.

"My goal will be to build a substantial FCPA practice," Mendelsohn tells the newspaper, explaining that he took the job because "Paul Weiss presented a perfect opportunity to build a practice where I could be entrepreneurial."