The Corruption Of White Collared Crime

Criminals walk amongst us everyday. When people hear the word criminal, “murderer”, “robber”, and “arsonist”, are what most people think of. No one thinks about the CEO of a billion dollar company, the everyday pharmacist, or even a trusted personal financial advisor. This is due to the “respectability” and “high social status” these occupations hold (Temchenko, 2016). Of the many crimes committed every year, white collar crimes are one of the most highest crimes committed because they are overlooked. On July 28, 2016 , 14-year-old Bresha Meadows, who had no prior record of violence, was arrested and potentially up for a life sentence in prison for saving her family from more domestic abuse by shooting her father (Jeltsen, 2016) . In 2003 the former chairman and chief executive of MCSi Michael E. Peppel, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy, money laundering and filing false documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission was only sentenced to spend seven days in prison because Peppel was a “remarkably good man”. The charges against Peppel carry a minimum 8 year sentence (Henning, 2013). Sentencing disparities between white collar crime versus street crime is a crime within itself and some form of justice needs to be served.

White collar crime is often associated with crimes committed within businesses. These include different forms of fraud such as tax fraud, welfare fraud, money laundering, and property crime (Simpson & Benson, 2009: 42). These forms of white collar crime often have a huge impact on the welfare of the society in profound ways. For instance, according to an article authored by McGrath, a company that suffers losses from fraud must make up for this loss by for example raising the prices of its products. Hikes in prices would mean that consumers would be required to dig dipper into their pockets thus affecting their finances. The loss from fraud could also make the affected company to take drastic measures such as layoffs or implementing salary cuts for the employees (McGrath, n.d).

Why discuss the development of the marketplace? Why is it central to the concept of white-collar crime?

White-collar crimes are just as prevalent today as ordinary street crimes. Studies show that criminal acts committed by white-collar criminals continue to increase due to unforeseen opportunities presented in the corporate world, but these crimes are often overlooked or minimally publicized in reference to criminal acts on the street. Many street crimes are viewed as unnecessary, horrendous crimes because they are committed by lower class citizens, whereas white collar crimes are illegal acts committed by seemingly respectable people whose occupational roles are considered successful and often admired by many (Piquero, 2014). These views often allow white collar crimes to “slip through the cracks” and carry lesser charges or punishment.

White-collar crime poses a vexing problem for the criminal justice system (CJS). It is an

(Jones and Jing) Though citizens might not see the effects of health care fraud directly, everyone is impacted in one way or another either through increased taxes, high insurance costs, or the inability to afford health care coverage. While we all hear about major frauds in the system, a majority of the frauds are small and usually go through undetected, unreported, or seriously underreported. (Sparrow) These small frauds add up to be a huge problem. There is a large spectrum of frauds in the health-care systems ranging from the theft of a wheelchair, to organized crime groups that steal patient information and bill for phantom services in multimillion-dollar schemes. (Jones and Jing) In many cases, the fraud is minor but all the small scams add up to an enormous loss to the public. For example, the frequent occurrences of forging of a doctor’s signature on a prescription accounts for billions of dollars lost each year. (Jones and Jing) One of the most common crimes involves billing for services that were never performed. This involves a health care provider submitting a false claim to be paid for a patient that was never treated or adding on services to a patient. For example a doctor may obtain names of other people such as a patients spouse or child who are covered by insurance and put in a claim for them as well as the actual patient. (FBI) Another common fraudulent activity involves upcoding of services. This is when a healthcare

Healthcare services have been on the rise for over 10 years now. According to a 2012 consumer alert, the industry provided $2.26 trillion in payments for more than four billion health insurance benefit claims in the year 2011(Fraud in Health Care). The bulk of the claims and the mainstream of fraud and abuse stem from the Medicare system professionals, who are knowledgeable about the process and persuade new clients into handing over their pertinent information in hopes of deception and illegitimate claims. Multiple and double billing, fraudulent prescriptions, are some of the major flaws in this organization that has made the healthcare services industry curdle. (AGHAEGBUNA, 2011) This is a non-violet crime and is often committed by very

Most people, when they hear the word “crime,” think about street crime or violent crime such as murder, rape, theft, or drugs. However, there is another type of crime that has cost people their life savings, investors’ billions of dollars, and has had significant impacts of multiple lives; it is called white collar crime. The Federal Bureau of Investigation defines white collar crime as

These people have more opportunities to commit a white collar crime than a person with little authority. Peter Michelmore, a journalist for Readers Digest describes this situation well in his article, "On the Trail of a Scam" He describes a savings and loan scam and the man behind it all. "Meyer learned that New Era was run by John G. Bennet, Jr., a 57 year old evangelical Christian." (112) New Era was a getting money from a private university, in which he promised huge returns on their investment. New Era did show them huge profits, but only to gain their trust and invest more money. The private university was gaining trust in New Era and investing more money. Finally, when They had invested a large sum of money, New Era collapsed and John Bennet walked away with the university's money. Mr. Bennet is a prime example of our findings. He is a man over the age of eighteen and he is in a position of power. People have entrusted him with their money. To commit his crime, he needed to be in a position where he was trusted, or in authority. After he won their trust, he took their money. White collar crimes are growing at an alarming rate and must be curbed. There are many things that the nation can do to slow the growth of these crimes. The white collar crime that affects the most people is the scam. For that reason, scam prevention will be emphasized more than embezzlement. I feel that the most effective weapon against these crimes is to

There are many theories and sub-theories on why white-collar crime occurs, just as there are many theories and sub-theories on why street crime occurs. However, as with any theory dealing with sociology, there are faults as human nature is hard to define generally.

White-Collar Crime consists of occupational crime and corporate crime. Occupational crime refers to offences committed against legitimate institutions businesses or government by those with "respectable" social status. It includes the embezzlement of corporate funds, tax evasion, computer crime and expense-account fraud. It is not every day that we hear about white-collar crimes but these non-violent crimes are on the rise to the top. Federal Bureau of Investigation states that USA, for example recorded white collar crimes amounting $300 billion every year (Cornell University, 2010). White-collar crime is relatively a new idea. It has many aspects that are practical for study and further interpretation to clear some of its dark areas. White-Collar Crime was once introduced by Edwin Sutherland in 1939 during his speech in American Sociological Society. The following crimes actually performed are Bribery, Extortion, Insurance, Fraud, Embezzlement, Cybercrime etc. People who participate in these criminal activities are highly powerful and respectful among the society. The following activities include description about White-collar Crime, Investigation of White Collar Crime and The Consequences of committing a White-collar Crime.

In this paper the exciting criminal phenomenon known as white-collar crime will be discussed. Corporate Crime and Computer Crime will be discussed in detail. Crime preventative agencies such as the NCPC (National Crime Prevention Council) will also be researched. White Collar Crime The late Professor Edwin Sutherland coined the term white-collar crime about 1941. Sutherland defined white-collar crime as "a crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status in the course of his occupation" (Siegel 337) White-collar crime includes, by way of example, such acts as promulgating false or misleading advertising, illegal exploitation of employees, mislabeling of goods, violation of weights and measures statutes, conspiring to

Simply defined, white collar crime can be described as “A nonviolent crime committed for financial gain.” White collar crime can occur in the form of securities fraud, embezzlement, money laundering, and other illegal activities than generate financial returns outside of legal practices. In the extremely competitive business world, white collar crime and other scandals are unfortunately very common. Just recently one of the United States largest banking companies, Wells Fargo, was found to have generated over 3 million fake banking or credit card accounts. The source of these fake accounts stems from lofty sales goals set by the Wells Fargo management team. As employees struggle to meet goals and keep their jobs, good people can turn to bad and often illegal decisions to stay afloat.

In society we constantly encounter many different illicit acts and crime organizations. There is White Collar Crime, Organization Deviance, Corporate Crime and Organized crime. Many activities overlap one another but all of them eventually lead to an erosion of quality of life in society as it affects basic rights to peace, order and good government. Organized crime consists of a group of criminals who tend to participate in illicit activities usually in the purpose of making profit. There are many different groups that fall under this category such as human trafficking, money laundering, blackmailing, kidnapping, smuggling and drug trafficking amongst others.

The concept of white-collar crime was first explained in the field of criminology by a professor known as Edwin Sutherland in the year 1941 (Sutherland, Geis & Goff, 1983). He defined this type of crime as a one which is committed by persons of respectability and high social class in the course of their occupation. Examples of such a crime include infringement of patents, false advertisements, publication of falsified information such as balance sheet for a particular business, concealment of defects in goods that are meant for sale and passing of products (Braithwaite, 1985). White collar crimes are such that the damage caused can spread to the whole public and to some extent the effect is always trifling.