At the invitation of attorney Jonathan Rose, I attended the 2019 Orlando Margarita Ball with Teresa Holleran on Saturday night. The Margarita Ball is a formal event with guests donating toys to underprivileged children for Christmas. The event was well attended and there was a mountain of toys for the children.
In 1990, Dan resigned from the U.S. Customs Service to attend Memphis State Law School. After graduating from law school, Dan was hired through the United States Department of Justice’s Honors Program as an Assistant Regional Counsel for the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Kansas City. He handled matters involving high-profile inmates including Christopher Boyce (Falcon and the Snowman), Omar Abdel-Rahman (First World Trade Center Bombing), Leonard Peltier (Killing of an FBI agent at Pine Ridge Indian Reservation), Ted Kaczynski (Unabomber), Jonathan Pollard (Israeli spy), Tim McVeigh (Oklahoma City Bombing), and John Gotti (Gambino Crime Family). Dan investigated staff misconduct and various security threat groups including the Aryan Brotherhood and the Mexican Mafia. Dan was promoted to Senior Litigation Counsel and assigned to the Coleman Federal Correctional Complex in Central Florida. One of Dan’s cases, Lopez vs. Davis, was heard by the United States Supreme Court in 2000. Dan was sworn in by former Chief Justice Rehnquist and provided litigation assistance to the DOJ Office of Solicitor General.
In 2002, Dan left the Federal Bureau of Prisons to become an Assistant United States Attorney (federal prosecutor) in the Middle District of Florida, Orlando Division. Dan worked in the civil, asset forfeiture, and criminal divisions during his ten years with the office. Dan’s forfeiture knowledge helped him successfully prosecute international money-laundering cases. He traveled to Brazil, Mexico, Panama, Ireland, and the Netherlands to work with prosecutors and agents. He also handled and tried complex white-collar matters including bank fraud, mortgage fraud, money laundering, tax fraud, FOREX trading, healthcare fraud, bankruptcy fraud, and Ponzi/investment schemes. Dan received recognition from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the United States Secret Service (USSS), and the Office of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).
In 2013, Dan became a partner at Newsome Melton, an Orlando law firm specializing in product liability, class actions, and federal whistleblower cases. He left Newsome to become General Counsel and Corporate Security Officer for Seaside National Bank, a private bank in Orlando. In addition to handling the bank’s legal matters, Dan was responsible for cyber-security and fraud investigations and worked closely with the Bank Secrecy Act and Anti-Money Laundering, and compliance departments.
Dan started his own law firm, “Dan Eckhart Law” in 2017. His clients have included lawyers, doctors, police officers, coaches, churches, pharmacists, medical facilities, correctional officers, federal agents, bankers, small business owners, and money service businesses. He has represented persons accused of timeshare fraud, bribery of government officials, lottery fraud, health care fraud, money laundering, drug smuggling, attempted murder, possession of child pornography, narcotics distribution, murder, contracting fraud, and investment fraud. He successfully defended allegations brought by the NCAA, the Florida Department of Financial Services, the Florida Department of Health, the Florida House of Representatives, Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, the Securities Exchange Commission, Homeland Security, FBI, and DEA. He has also defended clients charged with state offenses in Florida, Tennessee and Michigan.
Dan has been a speaker for the Association of Certified Money Laundering Specialist (ACAMS), Offshore Alert, the International Association of Financial Crime Investigators (IAFCI), the Florida Bankers Association, the Federal Bar Association, and the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center. Topics have included cryptocurrency, money laundering, asset forfeiture, cyber-security, white-collar crime, investment fraud, Suspicious Activity Reports, and various compliance and Bank Secrecy Act issues.
Dan spoke in London, Miami, Las Vegas, Orlando, the Cayman Islands and at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center. He was also an adjunct law professor at Barry Law School from 2017-2018 teaching Trial Advocacy. He has been featured on CNN, the BBC, in the Washington Post, in Variety and several local news outlets. He has been a regular contributor on New Nations’ show “Banfield.” Dan is licensed to practice law in Florida, Missouri, and Kansas. He is also admitted to the Northern, Middle, and Southern Districts of Florida, the Eastern and Western Districts of Michigan, and the District of Columbia. He is “Of Counsel” with Abood Law, a prominent firm established in Lansing, Michigan in 1956. Dan was one of four attorneys appointed to the Merit Selection Panel for the Middle District of Florida to recommend two new federal magistrate judges in 2018 and 2019. He was again selected as one of the Top 100 Trial Lawyers by the National Trial Lawyers Association in 2025.