Azevedo Sette Advogados

Compliance, Investigations and White-Collar

Franco is a senior partner and head of Azevedo Sette Advogados’ Compliance practice in our São Paulo office. She draws upon more than 20 years’ experience in all areas of compliance, from preparing full-fledged compliance programs, to trainings, investigations, risk assessments, assistance with whistleblowers, among others.

She was the first Brazilian to have been appointed as a monitor by the US Department of Justice (DOJ) and Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for a Brazilian company in its Plea Agreement with such authorities.

English, Spanish and Portuguese

Franco is a member of the Compliance Women Committee (CWC), an Adjunct Assistant Professor at Fordham University School of Law (NY, USA), a Member of the Board of Directors at The American Society of São Paulo. Before joining Azevedo Sette, Isabel was partner of Compliance and Corporate practices in Brazil’s leading law firms. She was foreign associate at Freshfields in special investigation project (Hong Kong, 1988-1990).

Franco received an LL.B. from the Universidade de São Paulo Law School. She was admitted to practice in São Paulo, Brazil, 1978. She attended  the Program of Instruction of Lawyers at Harvard University and received an LL.M from Fordham Law School in New York (USA).

She is considered a senior statement in Compliance, ranked by international directories as Chambers Latin America and Chambers Brazil as Band 1, the highest ranking, and recognized as "Foreign Expert for USA" by Chambers Global. Isabel is also recommended in The Legal 500 and Best Lawyers guides as Top listed in Corporate and M&A Law, Corporate Governance & Compliance practices. In Who’s Who is recognizes in Global Elite 2021 and National guides in Investigations and Business Crime Defense. She garners praise for her ability to “summarise complex legal and compliance topics in a clear, practical and synthetic way”. In Leaders League ranking and LL250, Isabel is recommended in Compliance, Investigations, Anti-corruption and Fraud practices.

For years, Franco has been nominated Number 1 lawyer in Latin America in the practice of anti-corruption and compliance by the Latin American Corporate Counsel Association (LACCA) and was included in the list of the 100 best investigators in the world by the Global Investigations Review (GIR). Also is considered by the Análise Advocacia  and Análise Advocacia Mulher as one of the most admired lawyers in São Paulo state in Compliance matters and reference to Energy: Power, Chemical and Petrochemical, Eletronics, Rubber and Plastics, Packaging, Pharmaceutical and Cosmectics, Health, and Specialized Services sectors.