Criminal vs Civil Law
In this document, I will give definition to criminal and civil law and explain how corporate personhood allows for lawsuits to be filed in corporate America.
Criminal law, “a body of rules and statues that define conduct prohibited by the government because it threatens and harms public safety and welfare and that establishes punishment to be imposed for the commission of such acts.” Substantive criminal law there’s a crime and it may require punishment. Crimes can be defined as felonies or misdemeanors. Felonies are much serious with evidence proofing could be punishment of many years in jail or even death. While misdemeanors are less serious and punishment can be a fine or less than a year in jail. There
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In a criminal lawsuit the Corporation can be sued, but the criminality falls to the bodies involved in the criminal activity at the company. Two significant criminal cases of criminal activities in this last century involved several executives, specifically the CEOs of Enron (2001) and MCI (2002) where criminal charges were brought against these leaders for fraudulent accounting practices. In Enron’s case $74 billion was lost in shareholder’s value, thousands of employee jobs, retirement accounts was lost and the company is no longer in existence. Two CEOS, Jeff Skilling and Ken Lay were convicted of 24 years of jail time. In the case of MCI/WorldCom, the company inflated profits by $11 billion, which resorted in $18 billion lost to investors, 30,000 jobs were lost. Bernie Ebbers MCI’s CEO was sentenced to 25 years in jail. These two criminal cases, created the greatest change in business regulations since 1930 and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) was put into place to protect investors from the possibility of fraudulent accounting activities by corporations. The SOX Act mandated strict reforms to improve financial disclosures from corporations and prevent accounting fraud.
Civil lawsuits against corporations can vary. They can be against branding, a contractual basis and even labor/human rights. In 1998, Marc Kasky filed suit
The following case is one of the most famous white-collar crime cases known to date. Enron Corporation was an American energy company based out of Houston, Texas. Kenneth Lay formed Enron in 1985 after a huge merger. Over time Enron’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO) and other corporate executives misled auditors and the board of directors in major financial transactions. Thus, $11 million dollars was lost by shareholders after Enron’s stocks dramatically fell in the end of 2001. Enron was then bankrupt. In this case, many Enron executives were sentenced to prison, a rare punishment for white-collar crime. As a result of this incident, the Sarbanes- Oxley Act was enacted. This act ensured that there would be
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX), also known as the Public Company Accounting Reform and Investor Protection Act and the Auditing Accountability and Responsibility Act, was signed into law on July 30, 2002, by President George W. Bush as a direct response to the corporate financial scandals of Enron, WorldCom, and Tyco International (Arens & Elders, 2006; King & Case, 2014;Rezaee & Crumbley, 2007). Fraudulent financial activities and substantial audit failures like those of Arthur Andersen and Ernst and Young had destroyed public trust and investor confidence in the accounting profession. The debilitating consequences of these perpetrators and their crimes summoned a massive effort by the government and the accounting profession to fight all forms of corruption through regulatory, legal, auditing, and accounting changes.
Bergman, Paul J.D. & Berman, Sara J. J.D. (2011) The Criminal Law Handbook, 12th Edition. Know your rights, survive the system.
You have many rights as a US citizen including the right to Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. Furthermore, according to our democratic system and the rule of law, criminal procedure give to every US citizen the fundamental rights of:
There are two major areas of law, civil law and criminal law. As a society, people tend to not pay attention to law unless they are in the middle of an issue. The two areas of law are important to know though, since an issue can occur at any time and it is important to be prepared and have a basic understanding of what is happening and what to do. Many people do not know the distinction between civil law and criminal law, and while the ramifications vary considerably for each, the cases can occur simultaneously, which is why it is important to know the differences and in what scenarios each form is used.
Just like people, corporations have the capability of committing criminal acts. The Enron scandal in 2001; the Bernard Madoff ponzi-scheme of 2008-2009; both of these examples show that despite internal and external controls, regulations, and oversight, corporations still are a multi-faceted entity that have the propensity to partake in crime. That being true, that criminal entity must be punished and held responsible for their actions. One tool in the prosecutorial tool belt is the use of deferred prosecution and non-prosecution agreements. According to Lanny Breuer, the United States Department of Justice’s Criminal Division, “over the last decade, deferred prosecution agreements have become a mainstay of white collar criminal law
There are two types of cases, criminal case and civil case. Criminal cases involve the process of getting an individual out of jail(slides 20-21). The civil case figures out which side wins effectively by contrasting the measure of confirmation. The two types of jurisdiction are original jurisdiction and Appellate jurisdiction. In an original jurisdiction, this when the court hear witness testimony, review evidence submitted, hear arguments by attorneys, and decisions rendered by the judgeslide(29). The second one is appellate jurisdiction, is to review whether the procedure made by the original cases done corrtecly and if the defend/defense deserves a new trial.The most important one is orginal jurisdiction because they deal more the with
Civil law and Criminal law are two very different and separate distinct of law with separate sets of laws and punishments. According to William Geldart, Introduction to English Law 146 (D.C.M. Yardley ed., 9th ed. 1984)] "The difference between civil law and criminal law turns on the difference between two different objects which law seeks to pursue or punishment. The object of civil law is the punishment of wrongs by restitution only suffers so much harm as is necessary to make good the wrong he has done. The person who has suffered gets a benefit from the law, or at least he avoids a loss. On the other hand, in the case of crimes, the main object of the law is to punish the guilty person and help them not commit same crimes anymore. It is to help them counsel their problems and help them get out that stage. It also helps prove to the judges that they are not merely insane and get them out of trouble. [Examples of criminal law include cases of burglary and assault or even murder when in the other hand examples where civil law happen include cases of negligence.] The types of punishment for Civil Law is to compensate for any injuries or damages that have been done, and the types of punishments for Criminal Law is when death penalty is involved.
This assignment required me to differentiate between civil and criminal cases, and explain my rationale for labeling these cases as either civil or criminal. Therefore, it is important to begin with an explanation of both a civil case and a criminal case. The lines between the two can be blurry at times, but they do have definite differences when examined. Criminal cases are initiated by the state or Federal government after a defendant violates a criminal statute, and are used to discourage socially. Criminal law also provides rehabilitation to those committing crimes against society, behaving within societal norms is the desired outcome upon completion of their debt to society (p 400). Some actions can be both civil cases and criminal cases. For example, if an assault occurred, the defendant violated a criminal statute, and is guilty of an intentional tort violation by intentionally causing physical harm to the injured party. Although both the criminal and civil violation occurred simultaneously, both cases would need to be heard in different courts. Civil violations are violations of tort law, torts are non-contractual violations resulting in injury, either physical, emotional, or to the person’s reputation.
The Rule of Law, as expressed through Canadian criminal law is important as our laws embody the basic moral values of society. The primary aims of criminal law are to protect the public and preserve peace (Barnhorst & Barnhorst, 2013). Law also imposes limits on our actions and guides our choices in conduct. The conditions of the Rule of Law ensure that no individual, government or parliament is treated as above the law, and that everyone must obey the law or they must suffer the consequences.
Criminal Law refers to federal and state laws that make certain illegal behavior and punishable by imprisonment and /or fines. In United States, the law system is included two different types of cases, one is civil, another one is criminal cases. Besides, the charges pursued by prosecutors for violations of criminal statutes. When it comes to the history of the criminal law, the United States’ common law were ruled by British within colonial times. Common law is a process that establishes and improved rules that govern some nations. U.S. continues to employ a common law system, which works in combination with state and federal statutes, after they became an independent nation. They adopted the U.S. Constitution as “the
The law is defined as is defined as the body of rules of conduct created by the government and enforced by government authority. Without any rules or behaviour, life in a group would be difficult, if not impossible. In order to master criminal law, there must be an understanding of the context in which criminal law exists.
What is Respondeat Superior? It is a legal doctrine and actually is Latin for ‘let the master answer’ which states that, in many circumstances, an employer is responsible for the actions of employees performed within the course of their employment. This rule is also called the master-servant rule, recognized in both common law and civil law jurisdictions
The definition of a crime is an offensive act against society that violates a law and is punishable by the government. Criminal laws are defined in laws that are called statutes. There are many different types of crime, all of them punishable in different ways. Crimes are labeled based on the severity of the crime and prior criminal records. Cybercrimes are any violations of criminal law that involve a knowledge of computer technology for their perpetration, investigation or prosecution. (Volonino & Anzaldua, 2007)
In November 2016, several merchants who had previously opted out of the 2012 settlement (led by Target, 7-Eleven and Home Depot, and now styled as the “Direct Action Plaintiffs”) sent letters notifying Judge Brodie that they wanted to amend their complaints. . Defendants vigorously objected and filed letter replies. . All the parties – including the Rule 23(b)(3) and Rule 23(b)(2) Class Plaintiffs – appeared before the Court for a December 8, 2016 Status Conference. . Shortly after the Conference, the parties submitted a unified briefing schedule and fully briefed their arguments (the briefs were initially served but not filed on the court’s docket). . The parties made their oral arguments to Magistrate Judge James Orenstein on