Nvidia: Jun Kim leads Jensen Huang investigation

Lawyer Jun Kim appointed by artificial intelligence chip giant Nvidia The move was to investigate former CEO Jensen Huang, whose large law firm has a long history of investigating high-profile cases.

During his career as a top federal prosecutor and as a lawyer in private practice, Kim has targeted the son of mobster John “Teflon Don” Gotti, former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and other prominent figures and companies.

Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, the law firm that Kim recently joined, conducted an investigation this year into the NBA’s Los Angeles Clippers and its billionaire owner, Steve Ballmer, which ended with the basketball league imposing harsh sanctions on Ballmer and the Clippers for violating salary cap rules related to superstar Kawhi Leonard.

Nvidia said on Tuesday that it had hired Kim, 55, and Wachtel (Lipton) to “conduct a thorough and independent investigation” into allegations that then-CEO Jensen Hwang was the target of foreign intelligence operations related to an extramarital affair with a woman named Alice Hwang. US intelligence suspects her to be a Chinese spy.

Jensen Huang resigned as CEO on Thursday morning after the New York Times reported that he also had an affair with Kimberly Powell, an Nvidia executive who worked for him.

The allegations could be added to the list of issues Kim will look into as part of his investigation.

Nvidia did not immediately respond when asked whether the parameters of the investigation would be affected by the new claims. Lipton, Wachtel’s spokesperson, declined to comment on behalf of Wachtel and Kim for this article.

Friends and former colleagues of Kim said Nvidia made a wise decision to keep him on.

“I think he’s the perfect person for this role,” said Edward Kim, a New York white-collar defense attorney who worked with Jun Kim in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York. The two men are not related.

Edward Kim said, “They will undergo a serious and reliable investigation. I believe Mr. Jun will pursue the facts wherever he goes.”

The son of a South Korean diplomat, Jun Kim was born in Los Angeles. He attended Phillips Exeter Academy and then Stanford University.

After graduating magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, he clerked for a federal judge in Manhattan and then worked as an associate at the major law firm Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton in the late 1990s. He then spent seven years as an assistant U.S. attorney at the SDNY. His tenure as a prosecutor included four years in the Organized Crime and Terrorism Countermeasures Division.

Because of its location in Manhattan, SDNY handles some of the nation’s highest-profile criminal investigations, including serious financial crimes, government corruption, and organized crime.

During his first stint at SDNY, Kim investigated and prosecuted crimes including “extortion, murder, money laundering, securities fraud, firearms and drug crimes, tax evasion, and terrorism,” the agency previously announced.

Kim’s legal victories in the SDNY included the conviction of Peter Gotti, then head of the Gambino Mafia family, for conspiring to murder notorious Mafia turncoat Salvatore “Sammy the Bull” Gravano. But Kim and his fellow prosecutors had less success prosecuting Peter Gotti’s nephew, John Gotti Jr., and the trial ended with several hung jurors.

“He could be a very tenacious advocate in court,” says Chris Conniff, a New York attorney who worked with Kim at the SDNY and considers her one of his best friends.

“He’s incredibly smart,” Conniff said. “I think he’s known by everyone in the industry as a great investigator who will do whatever it takes.”

Mr. Kim returned to Cleary Gottlieb in 2006 as a partner in the firm’s Litigation and Enforcement Group, but returned to SDNY in 2013. During his second term there, he served as acting U.S. attorney and then served as U.S. attorney from 2017 to 2018.

Kim’s promotion to acting U.S. attorney came after President Donald Trump fired then-U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara in March 2017 after she refused the new president’s request to resign.

“Mr. Preet’s departure was very unique,” Conniff said, adding that the atmosphere at SDNY after his ouster was “unstable.”

“Preet was very well-liked and well-respected,” said Conniff, who was in private practice at the time Bharara was fired. “We lost a very charismatic and talented leader in a very dramatic way.”

“From my outside perspective, he righted the ship and continued to work at the office during his tenure,” said Kim, who succeeded Bharara.

“I would say June gave people confidence that it was going to be okay and that it was going to be business as usual,” Conniff said.

Mr. Kim left SDNY in April 2018 to begin his third stint at Cleary Gottlieb, but recently left to join Wachtel, Lipton’s litigation division.

In March 2021, Kim and another attorney, Anne Clark, a partner at the law firm of Vladek, Raskin & Clark, were asked by New York State Attorney General Letitia James to investigate then-Governor Kim. Andrew Cuomo is accused of sexually harassing multiple women.

“These are serious charges that require a rigorous and fair investigation,” Kim said in a statement at the time. “We will act wisely and follow the facts wherever they lead.”

Kim and Clark submitted a 165-page report to James in August 2021 that concluded that Cuomo sexually harassed at least 11 women and then retaliated against former employees who publicly complained about Cuomo’s behavior. As part of the investigation, Kim, Clark and their team interviewed 179 witnesses and reviewed tens of thousands of documents.

Mr. Cuomo has categorically denied some of the allegations and said other allegations of misconduct have been mischaracterized or misinterpreted.

A week after the report was released, Cuomo announced his resignation.

Two years after the Cuomo investigation, Kim was hired by the FDIC to conduct an independent investigation into allegations of sexual harassment and interpersonal misconduct within the agency. As part of the investigation, Kim and his team conducted 167 interviews with current and former FDIC employees and hundreds more with individuals who contacted a hotline set up by the team for employees to report allegations of misconduct.

An April 2024 report by Kim and his team found that “for too many employees, for too long, the FDIC has failed to provide a workplace safe from sexual harassment, discrimination, and other interpersonal misconduct.”

More than five years have passed since Cuomo left office, but the former governor’s press secretary has not forgotten or forgiven Kim. He accused Kim of writing a report with predetermined results regarding Cuomo.

Kim is a “hired hacker,” said spokesman Rich Azzopardi.

Azzopardi said Kim “hidden evidence” that would have exonerated Cuomo and accepted at face value the “blatant lies” of many witnesses.

The strained relationship between Cuomo’s camp and Chairman Kim predates the sexual harassment investigation.

Kim and Bharara, who worked at the SDNY, oversaw the investigation that led to the corruption trial of Joseph Percoco, a former Cuomo aide. The trial took place after both prosecutors retired.

Mr. Azzopardi cited the prosecutor in his scathing remarks against Mr. Kim.

Percoco was convicted of honest services wire fraud in 2018 and sentenced to six years in prison. The conviction was overturned by a unanimous U.S. Supreme Court in 2023 after he was released because the judge’s instructions to the jury were too vague.

Azzopardi said Kim and Bharara were motivated to prosecute Percoco for “their own personal glory” and “to make headlines for themselves.”

Mr. Bharara responded to Mr. Azzopardi’s claims with a two-word email, writing, “Andrew, who?” referring to Mr. Cuomo.

Azzopardi said he believes NVIDIA’s board has no reason to retain Kim to investigate Hwang’s situation other than to reach a predetermined outcome.

“I don’t know what the purpose of the board is,” Azzopardi said.

Asked whether he expected Nvidia’s investigation to turn out to be a subterfuge to serve the board’s interests, Kim’s friend Conniff said “no.”

Conniff said, “I don’t think Mr. Jun will accept any promises that would prevent him from submitting a sufficient report on the findings of this investigation.” “Mr. Joon is the perfect fit for a company’s board of directors seeking to conduct a proper and thorough investigation into potential wrongdoing.”