White Collar Crime and Its Definition Controversy

Subject: Law
Pages: 3
Words: 743
Reading time:
3 min

White-collar crime involves illegal activities that involve manipulation and concealment where prosecutors determine the person liable for prosecution depending on his status. Some crimes are very dangerous and need to be dealt with immediately without discrimination or favor. White-collar crime depends on the class of people when taking disciplinary action but not the crime itself making low-class people be disadvantaged because high-class people are treated fairly. There has been controversy in defining white-collar crime where government involves itself in deceitful conduct through the use of false records in carrying out criminal investigations. Neglected victims have been denied their rights and end up suffering due to a lack of protection.

White-collar crimes are illegal activities that are not violent and involve manipulation, deception, subterfuge, and concealment. The prosecutors have a duty to determine the person who is supposed to be prosecuted but the choice made can be political. White-collar crime is also the social and economic status of people who commit a crime. This means that a person in either middle class or upper class is involved in white-collar crime due to his origin. If a crime becomes violent, it cannot be considered a white-collar crime because; it is dangerous and needs to be dealt with without favor or discrimination. The advantage of white-collar criminals is that they are taken to minimum security prison where freedom is great and the environment is safe because white-collar crime is considered to be minor and of low gravity even if the damage by the criminal is beyond repair.

The definition shows that white-collar crime is based on classes of people where it is mostly concerned with who committed the crime rather than what crime has been committed. The crime is committed by a respectable person with high status during his occupation and the punishment or disciplinary action is based on the status of the criminal. When a low-class person commits a crime, the administrative procedures for dealing with his offense are different from that of a person of high socioeconomic class because what is of significance is who committed the crime but not the causation of the crime. Many white-collar crimes in federal offenses are public welfare offenses or regulatory offenses instead of true crimes and guidelines need to be put in place on the treatment of such offenders.

Interpretation and Feelings Regarding the Vast Controversy in Defining White Collar Crime.

Major loss has been suffered by the defense and district courts have concluded that the government is involved in deceitful conduct and violation of the defendants by pursuing criminal investigations and falsification of financial records. The lower court said that, in the case of a criminal trial, the evidence of individual defendants should always be suppressed. The government has said that there is the possibility of information received in the civil investigation being used during criminal proceedings. The government had a decision not to conduct a criminal investigation in the open but it is proper for the government to have civil investigations and there is no deceit or misrepresentation that justifies the suppression of evidence or dismissal of charges. All the clients are prepared by the attorney for hearing but there is a problem in ensuring that the memory of clients fades in order to exchange it for favors. Attorneys have investigators who arrange the testimony and law firms with experienced people.

White-collar crime is a reflection of the old movement involved in changing the definition of crime. Sociologists do not agree with procedural principles used in criminal law and dismiss the traditional intention of criminals who are presumed to be innocent. The interpretation is that criminals who are not proved guilty are not supposed to be prosecuted in criminal courts and the ones who are exempted are many due to disregard for old principles used in criminal law.

Sutherland has a basis that facilitates convictions of corporations and executives who conceptualize white-collar crime by equating decisions made by regulatory agencies who have criminal convictions and put more emphasis on people who are thought to be innocent by establishing criminal liability. What was referred to as a crime was a regulatory violation that required no enforcement action because many of the crimes are unintended acts by people who did not know that their actions would result in a crime that is against the law?