On his first day as interim U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, Geoffrey Berman announced on Friday that he is hiring former government lawyer Robert Khuzami, a partner at Kirkland & Ellis with years of experience in the private sector, as his second-in-command.

Khuzami worked as a Southern District prosecutor from 1990 to 2002, and for three years headed up the office's securities and commodities fraud task force.

After leaving the office, Khuzami worked for Deutsche Bank AG, first as global head of litigation and regulatory investigations, then as general counsel for the Americas.

In 2009, he joined the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, serving as director of enforcement, and joined Kirkland in 2013, where he was reportedly hired for $5 million a year and where he headed up the firm's government and internal investigations practice group.

Joan Loughnane, who served as deputy under acting U.S. Attorney Joon Kim, will return to her previous position as chief counsel for the office. Kim has left the office and has not announced his future plans.

Berman's announcement comes just days after U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions appointed Berman and 16 others to head U.S. attorney's offices across the country.

Also on Friday, Sessions announced that the Department of Justice is hiring 40 new assistant U.S. attorneys who will focus on prosecuting violent crime.

According to announcement, two of the new AUSAs will be hired at the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York, where criminal activity by the MS-13 gang has been acknowledged by Sessions and President Donald Trump.

One of the new AUSAs is being picked up by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Western District of New York.