DOJ’s Eastern Virginia White Collar Chief Exits to Launch Firm, by Ben Penn
Law360 also reported the launch: Beltway Moves: Baker McKenzie, Armstrong & Bradylyons, by Alison Knezevich (Feb. 20, 2026).
Armstrong & Bradylyons PLLC opened on February 11, 2026. Bloomberg Law covered the launch, reporting that founding partners Scott Armstrong, a former Assistant Chief in DOJ’s Fraud Section, and Drew Bradylyons, most recently Chief of the Financial Crimes and Public Corruption Unit at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia, formed the firm to handle complex fraud cases and trials. The firm reunites the two former Fraud Section colleagues. Andrea Savdie, a former trial attorney in the Health Care Fraud Unit’s Miami Strike Force, joined the firm as special counsel.
The firm defends executives, financial professionals, and medical professionals nationwide in federal fraud investigations and at trial.
Scott told Bloomberg Law that the firm’s core business will be representing individuals and that its size is an advantage in that work.
“[At large-firm rates,] individual representation in complex matters is cost-prohibitive for a lot of people.”
Scott Armstrong, quoted in Bloomberg LawScott served nearly a decade in the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section as an Assistant Chief in the Market Integrity and Major Frauds Unit, Director of the Appalachian Regional Prescription Opioid Strike Force, and a trial attorney in the Health Care Fraud Unit. He was co-lead trial counsel against two senior traders at a major financial institution convicted of a years-long manipulation scheme in the precious metals futures markets, and lead trial counsel in the conviction of two defendants for a Ponzi scheme that laundered approximately $650 million through financial institutions. He was also lead trial counsel in the first trial conviction for conspiracy to commit securities price manipulation under Title 15 involving cryptocurrency, a case involving more than $300 million in spoof orders and wash trades placed by an automated trading bot, and lead counsel in the first criminal cherry-picking prosecution of a commodity trading advisor involving cryptocurrency futures.
In healthcare fraud, Scott served as lead counsel in cases involving more than $600 million in false and fraudulent claims to Medicare, Medicaid, TRICARE, and other federal programs. Those cases included the Fraud Section’s first use of data analytics to investigate, prosecute, and try a physician and clinic owner for conspiring to unlawfully dispense more than 2 million opioid pills. Before joining DOJ, Scott defended individuals at trial at an international law firm in Washington, D.C., including an in-house attorney acquitted of obstruction charges and an executive acquitted of charges arising from the BP oil spill. In all, Scott has tried 16 complex federal jury trials.
Drew spent more than a decade at DOJ in senior supervisory roles. As Chief of the Financial Crimes and Public Corruption Unit for more than three years, he supervised the prosecution of a cryptocurrency Ponzi scheme with hundreds of millions of dollars in investor losses, partnered with the SEC and CFTC on parallel enforcement matters, and supervised corporate investigations that resulted in more than $1 billion in penalties and fines. Those investigations included two multinational companies that paid bribes to foreign officials in Africa and the 2025 resolution in which Credit Suisse Services AG pleaded guilty to a tax conspiracy charge and agreed to pay more than $510 million.
At the Fraud Section, Drew served as a trial attorney in all three of its litigating units (Health Care Fraud, Market Integrity and Major Frauds, and Foreign Corrupt Practices Act) and as an Assistant Chief supervising the Health Care Fraud Unit’s Florida Strike Force. In healthcare fraud, he investigated and supervised cases involving more than $1 billion in fraudulent claims to Medicare, Medicaid, TRICARE, and other federal programs. He also brought a first-of-its-kind prosecution of a commodities insider trading ring in natural gas futures.
