Busting Up Corporate Crime

The more dramatic violent types of crimes tend to get far more attention in the press then corporate crimes. Despite this, the fact of the matter is that there are thousands of corporate crimes in some form committed every year. The numbers continue to climb each year with no end in sight. If you want to protect your company against these kinds of crimes or hold an investigation after this kind of crimes have been committed, then you need to hire a company that offers services in criminal corporate investigations.

A company that has these kind of services can often offer a number of different types of investigations to meet all of your needs. Some of the things that many of these companies can look into include corporate fraud, theft of intellectual property, and bribery. These three types of common corporate crime are something that if serious enough, can bring a company completely down. You do not want to have the good name of your company dragged through the dirt because of the actions of some rouge employee.

It is common public relations knowledge that you need to grab control of a story as quickly as possible in order to be able to control the story. You cannot allow a crime to be committed without an immediate investigation. What you need is a corporate investigation to turn up the individual or individuals responsible so that you might be able to show them to the public for what they have done. Being able to pin the blame of some crimes on those who actually committed them will likely help to save your company. The image of your company might be temporarily damaged, but this is something that you can work on over the long term to repair.

Corporate investigations are necessary in many cases because the crimes committed are just far too complicated to try to understand by yourself. Many of these corporate crimes are done by creatively shifting money around in many forms within your company. One of the services that many companies offer to prevent this is something known as asset tracing. Asset tracing is a process by which the company tracks your funds as they mutate into all its different forms within your company. It keeps track of it each step of the way so that you do not have to worry about trying to figure this out for yourself. Doing this will help you to have the red flag raised if something appears to be wrong. This is something that you may not have caught yourself for years down the road if ever.

Hire a corporate investigations company to work for your company today if you have had crimes committed within, or if you are just looking to prevent those crimes.

Know more about corporate investigations and how legal assistance can help you more.

Corporate Crime

Corporate crime? I'm not sure that there is such a thing. If we want to reduce the crimes that are given that lable, we need to quit handing out large punitive fines to corporations. The idea isn't as radical as it sounds.

First of all, when I say that there isn't such a thing as corporate crime, I simply mean that it is always individual people who commit crimes. With that in mind, you can imagine what my better way to reduce this crime is: Go after the criminals!

Who Pays For Corporate Crime?

Exactly who pays when a large corporation is fined for breaking the law? To begin with, the stockholders pay. Many of these are innocent retirees who have money invested with the company and had no idea they were breaking the law. Then the employees pay with the loss of jobs, if the financial situation of the company is damaged by the fines. Who doesn't pay? Just the criminals - the individuals who chose to break the law.

All crimes are committed by PEOPLE, not companies. When a company dumps poisons into the environment, a PERSON made the decision to do that (or several people). When a company steals from a pension fund or violates workers rights, INDIVIDUALS made those decisions. People commit corporate crime, not corporations!

If you want to stop corporate crime, start putting the individuals who are involved in the crime in PRISON. Our current system often has company officers making cost/benefit calculations as to whether the profits from certain crimes are greater than what the occasional fines add up to. Even though laws are broken, they stand little chance of being held personally responsible. Why not hold them responsible?

To fine companies for the actual costs imposed on others by a crime is appropriate. We have to clean up toxic messes, and in other cases compensate those who suffer damages. This also means that shareholders have a reason to be careful in who they elect to the board of directors. However, "punitive" fines are ridiculous unless they are levied against the individual criminals. Make the person who committed the crime pay the fine.

Is this such a radical idea? I don't think so! By the way, which do you think is more likely to deter a corporate officer from committing a crime, a fine that is paid by the company, and doesn't even affect his salary, or ten years in jail? The answer to that gives us the answer to corporate crime.

Steve Gillman has been exploring new ideas for decades. Visit his site for invention ideas, business ideas, story ideas, political and economic theories, deep thoughts, and more. Get a free gift too: New Ideas ( http://www.999ideas.com )

Crime Prevention Strategies As Part of Corporate Risk Management

Risk Management is part and parcel of corporate culture. It underscores and influences major decisions in organizations and should therefore be formalized. Risk management directly relates to accountability and must be enforced in all departments of an organization. By enforcing risk management, organizations stand to gain major benefits including increased bottom line results. Such benefits include:

1. Reduced damage on company property.

2. Reduced loss of working hours by staff.

3. Reduced Insurance Premiums.

4. Bigger financial savings.

5. Effective utilization of Organizational resources

6. Enhanced Communication between different departments

In order for an organization to implement an effective risk management policy, there must be a complete refocus of corporate priorities. The first step is to identify the inherent risks affecting the organization, then document the risks and finally come up with ways of preventing or stopping them. The process requires high levels of objectivity, transparency, consultation and innovation. It must therefore be treated as a high priority project and possibly, assigned to different managers for implementation.

One of the major risks affecting corporate organizations is crime. The Department of Justice estimates that over a million crimes are committed at the workplace every year. About 10% of these crimes involve offenders armed with handguns. As such, managers are required to form and implement astute crime reduction measures as part of their risk management policies.

Once you have set up a clear Crime policy, it will act as a benchmark for expected behavior and provide guidelines on how the company deals with criminal incidences. A crime policy notifies employees that specific behaviors will not be tolerated at the workplace. It forbids threats and harassment of any form and guides employees on how to report such incidences. A typical crime policy entails concerted effort and cooperation between Management and Human Resources.

A recently developed approach to Crime Prevention at the workplace entails the use of communication to prevent crime. Most workplace related crimes could have been prevented simply by effective communication between the concerned parties. Mutual communication between individuals, companies and law enforcement agencies can lead to crime prevention at the workplace.

Security companies have begun developing methods of reducing workplace related crimes and offenses through communication. This is achieved by compiling useful crime prevention data on one database, that can then be utilized by a pool of companies. The secure database is run by the security company and can be accessed selectively as and when it is needed.

All organizations must embrace Risk Management in order to operate successfully. Crime at the workplace is among the major risks facing corporate bodies in the US. It is therefore necessary for Managers to formulate effective Crime Prevention policies to protect both the Organization and the workers. One way of doing this is by signing up for database communication services offered by security companies.

Mr Joe Castaldo is a fraud expert with over 10 years experience as a law enforcement officer. Before forming IronNet Solutions, Mr. Castaldo served as a Lieutenant in Texas SWAT team.

Find out more about fraud and how to prevent it by logging onto http://www.ironnetsolutions.com

Lessons for Life: Corporate Crime; What Happened to those Boy Scouts?

Some of the most talented people in our society are in trouble with the law. Some are serving time in federal and state prisons. Some are waiting to be sentenced for crimes of which they have been convicted in courts of law.

From my experience, those who succeed temporally in life started from a spiritual base. They were raised in good homes and benefited from neighborhood, church, and school leaders. Many were Little Leaguers and good Boy Scouts. Now they are in trouble and their families are humiliated.

What went wrong?

Sarbanes-Oxley Act

I extracted and shortened the following from [http://www.criminaldefenseassociates.com/crimes/whitecollar]

In the wake of the Enron/Arthur Anderson scandal, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, mandated the separation of auditing and consulting businesses in an attempt to restore public confidence in the investment market.

“The Act created a number of new Federal crimes (i.e., document destruction and tampering, securities fraud, certification of false financial statements, and attempt and conspiracy), many of which apply to both public and private companies, their directors, officers, and employees.

“The Sarbanes-Oxley Act also significantly enhances penalties applicable to a host of existing white collar crimes.

“A number of Federal agencies including the FBI, the Internal Revenue Service, the Secret Service, U.S. Customs, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Securities and Exchange Commission, participate in the enforcement of Federal white collar crime legislation.

“In addition, most states employ their own agencies to enforce white collar crime laws at the State level.”

All Corporate Crimes are Not Prosecuted

At http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/deferredreport.htm is posted the report: Crime Without Conviction: The Rise of Deferred and Non Prosecution Agreements and I quote:

“This report finds that prosecutors have entered into twice as many non-prosecution and deferred prosecution agreements with major American corporations in the last four years (23 agreements between 2002 to 2005) than they have in the previous ten years (11 agreements between 1992 to 2001)…And it raises the question – are these companies too big to indict, to big to convict?”

See also http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0728-15.htm

Top Corporate Criminals

At http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/top100.html are listed the top 100 corporate criminals of the 1990s. I quote:

“The 100 corporate criminals fell into 14 categories of crime: Environmental (38), antitrust (20), fraud (13), campaign finance (7), food and drug (6), financial crimes (4), false statements (3), illegal exports (3), illegal boycott (1), worker death (1), bribery (1), obstruction of justice (1) public corruption (1), and tax evasion (1).”

Without going into details, the above report states that corporate crime damages far exceed that of street crimes both in cost to the public and in deaths.

The list comes in two versions. The Brief List simply states the corporation and the crime. The Annotated List gives more details. You will find some of our finest corporations on these lists.

Dumping: The Corporate Crime of the Century

We read this at http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/1979/11/dowie.html

“News: It's called dumping:

“When the U.S. government forces a dangerous drug, pesticide or other product off the domestic market, the manufacturer then sells that same product–frequently with the direct support of the State Department–throughout the rest of the world.”

In an associated article at http://www.motherjones.com/news/update/1979/11/where.html Where Are They Now? we read:

"News: What ever happened to those dumped products–and their dumpers? Eighteen years later, the MoJo Wire investigates."

The bottom line is that the restrictions placed by our government to protect our people do not apply to other peoples of the world.

It’s okay if a person dies from faulty drugs or medical machinery in Podunktoo.

Thou Shalt Not Bear False Witness: Exodus 20:16

As Martha Steward will testify, bearing false witness to our government is a major crime. She spent five months in the slammer because of that law.

Bearing false witness to the public is a crime that our government is exempt from. That is a law we need to fix. Public officials should be held accountable for what they say.

I think that Martha should have been fined $1000.00 and required to spend two weeks in public service sweeping the streets of Manhattan and passing out cookies to vagrants in front of the New York Stock Exchange.

Her silly lies were just a miner crime in my opinion.

News Flash: Corporate Crimes are People Crimes

Corporate crimes are performed by people, the employees of the corporation. Often they are not intentional.

Joe Blow opens Valve Number 609 and closes Valve 906 instead of the opposite.

Ten zillion tons of gung then flows into Little Bear Creek killing the fish, the frogs, and twelve butterflies.

The Corporation is fined and the corporation must clean up the mess to boot.

Other crimes, especially those involving money, are intentional. Corporate Fat Cats full of greed want to pad their retirement funds.

These same Fat Cats were once good citizens who grew up in good homes, went to good Universities (where some say they learned how to cheat), and were Pillars of the Community. Now they are jailbirds or disgraced.

Help for Those Corporate Biggies Not Now in Trouble but May Soon Be

There is a rule once used by some in our country. It is Honesty is the Best Policy.

Have that framed and put on your wall.

Another one is Integrity is Doing the Right Thing when No One is Looking.

Frame that too.

For light reading go to http://www.scouting.org/factsheets/02-503a.html and read the Scout Oath and Law.

If you were not a Boy Scout, go there and read it anyway. It can’t hurt.

copyright©John T. Jones, Ph.D.

John T. Jones, Ph.D. (tjbooks@hotmail.com), a retired college professor and business executive, Former editor of an international engineering magazine. To learn more about Wealthy Affiliate University go to his info site. If you desire a flagpole to Fly Old Glory, go to the business site.

More info: http://www.InternetBusinessToolCenter.com

Business web site: http://www.AAAFlagpoles.com

Street Crime Vs Corporate Crime - Which is More Damaging to the Country?

Lots of people believe that street crime is a very serious problem in this country. Others however, believe that corporate crime is far worse. Without a doubt, corporate crime is far more damaging to our society than all the street crimes put together. As a matter of fact, when one compares the dollar amount lost and bodily injuries inflicted as result of both crimes, corporate crime is way ahead of street crime. The FBI estimates that the total dollar amount lost to street crimes annually is about $4 billion. Now, this figure is chump change compared to the corporate crime losses from Enron, WorldCom and Tyco. Corporate health care fraud alone costs the taxpayers of this country about $300 billion, annually. Remember the savings and loan fraud of the nineties, called the biggest white collar crime in history, when a whooping $500 billon of taxpayers' money went down the drain.

Well, some say corporate crime is not violent compared to street crime. They say victims of corporate crimes are usually not seriously injured or killed. This is absolutely false. Corporate crime can also be violent. According to the FBI, about 16,000 people are killed in street crimes in this country, annually. Now, compare this to the 56,000 who die every year as a result of corporate criminal negligence. These are people who die from occupational diseases, environmental pollution, contaminated foods, and hazardous products and so on. Case in point, the recent deaths of 25 workers in a West Virginia coal mine, where the company knew these workers were operating in unsafe conditions.

Unbelievably, prior to this preventable tragedy, this same company had received 458 citations from federal inspectors. But the company believes that it's cheaper to run the mine in an unsafe way and risks people's lives than it is for them to comply with the laws. And to make matters worse, a couple of years ago the Department of Justice introduced what they referred to as the deferred prosecution agreement. With this agreement they can bring charges against a company and then tell the company, if you behave yourself for the next couple of years and stay out trouble, we will drop all the charges. Makes you wonder if they are on the corporate criminal's side or against them.

In conclusion, corporate crime is by far the most damaging crime in this country. While street murders are prosecuted every day, here in the United States, deaths from corporate criminal negligence are neither prosecuted as homicides nor as a violation of state or federal laws. Corporate crime is a cancer that is slowly killing this country and we must all work to toward getting rid of it.

Michael Imana is a freelance writer. His articles focuses mainly on personal, home and business security issues. He has published several ebooks on self-defense and home security products. He helped started Prosafety Systems, an internet-based company that specializes in providing the very latest in personal, home and business security products. He is dedicated to helping people protect themselves, their homes and their businesses.

http://www.myprosafety.com
http://www.myprospy.com

Street Crime Vs Corporate Crime - Which Is More Damaging to the Country?

When the community is moving towards progress, it is expected that the crimes will also increase and it can be therefore be concluded that progress means crime. Wherever a community exists, people should expect that crime is present because crime is inevitable as part of the sociological aspect of the community derived from the conflict between individuals. A human being must have to think in advance its defense against the criminals and always anticipate the occurrence of crime because crime will definitely come and find its own way to surface.

This dilemma has been present since the beginning of the history of human race because crime has been pre-planted into the human brain. If an individual cannot control the animal thing inside its fragile mind then there is a high probability that crime will occur. When crime occurs it will definitely leaves a damage of certain amount to lives or properties. Whether someone hates crime or not, a person must have to be accustomed to it and ensure yourself all the time to have enough shields and counter defenses when it strikes in surprise.

What is street crime? It is an offense that transpired in our streets or highways committed by a person inclined to violate the law and the few example of that is a simple pick pocketing, and to a much higher one, the highway robbery. Street crime is usually committed by a single individual or by a group. The amount of damage involve in this crime is usually of little value, however, there are lot of instances that the amount damage is also huge especially in the case of bank robbery which is also considered as street crime.

What is corporate crime? It is an offense in violation of the law usually perpetrated by corporation or its officers and employees. This crime is more complicated and the weight of this crime is really huge and the damage is certainly vast. Corporate crime is very well structured. Sometime a corporation or a juridical entity is usually used by those big time syndicates as front or shield in order to hide the true nature of their illegal transactions. Corporate crime is much dangerous since it has so many linkages. Gathering evidence that will prove corporate crime is really hard and it is very challenging because a case investigator must have to tie up or link its evidence gathered from one point to another.

Street crime usually takes a small amount of money while the potential amount of money involve in corporate crime is really huge. Street crime is habitually committed by a single individual or by group while corporate crime is always driven by a number of individual or group. The effect of street crime when it comes to a value of money involve has of little damage to the country. But if we talk about tourism industry street crime is really dangerous since it will drive away the potential visitors in coming to areas where street crimes are rampant. On the other hand corporate crime can have a vast potential of damage to country especially when it involves economic sabotage.

With regards to which crime is more damaging to the country, the answer is either of the two it depends of what sector in the society we are trying to address and the extent of damage incurred. These two categories of crimes we have discussed have both the potential of damaging the country in the great extent possible.

He is a poet and he authored the poetry book: Whisper of Life. He is an avid lover of poetry and born and raised in Surigao City, Philippines.

He earned two baccalaureate degrees: Bachelor of Science in Accountancy and Bachelor of Science in Criminology. He has also earned 36 academic units in Master of Public Administration. He is a registered criminologist. Please visit his personal website @ http://www.cesargealogo.com