Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney in Manhattan, is expected to select Lisa Zornberg as the new head of his criminal division.  Ms. Zornberg, currently a white-collar criminal defense lawyer, previously spent more than a decade in the U.S. attorney’s office, where her effective handling earned her the moniker, “a tiny tornado of a prosecutor.”

In returning to the office, Ms. Zornberg will take over for Daniel Stein, a longtime federal prosecutor who announced on Monday that he was stepping down to join the law firm Mayer Brown. Mr. Stein is the latest senior official to depart Mr. Bharara’s office – others being Sara Shudofsky, Arlo Devlin-Brown and Richard Zabel.  And yet Mr. Bharara, having served more than 7 years in his post, is showing no signs of leaving.

The role of criminal chief carries a great deal of cachet in Manhattan - and in the broader legal world. The criminal division acts as a crucial artery running through the U.S. attorney’s office, encompassing the prosecution of terrorism, cybercrime, Wall Street fraud and public corruption.

Ms. Zornberg, a partner at the firm Lankler Siffert & Wohl, served in the U.S. attorney’s office from 1998 to 2012, working in both the civil and criminal divisions. She rose to become chief of the complex frauds unit in the criminal division.  One of her more prominent cases was the prosecution of Charles Antonucci Sr., former CEO of the Park Avenue Bank. He was the first defendant convicted of trying to defraud the government’s Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP.