Do any white collar crimes call for death or life sentences?

I think most people here are stuck on the “white collar” part of “white collar” crime. A person who steals credit card information or property titles is just as much a white collar criminal as a Ken Lay or Martha Stewart. Release an identity thief into the public and he/she has just as much opportunity to reoffend as a house burgular or a car thief. As do pyramid schemers, phony insurance agents, and corporate embezzlers.

In fact, white collar criminals have MORE opportunity to reoffend than lots of other criminals do, simply because it’s close to impossible to avoid the arenas that got them in trouble in the first place. Once corporate embezzlers get out of jail, they still have to make money somehow, usually serving under someone who trusts them somehow (and even janitors and fry-jockeys have opportunity to steal from the till). Insurance scammers can still buy and benefit from insurance policies. Martha Stewarts still have the right to invest in stocks. Computer hackers aren’t permently barred from computers. A drug dealer can theoretically avoid drugs, child molesters are registered and legally restricted from contact with kids, and murderers have limited access to weapons. But because a white collar criminal takes advantage of the institutions that everyone needs to function (jobs, identity, finances), it is very hard to keep them away from temptations. It also makes them harder to spot. In that way, they are much better predators than, say, your run-of-the-mill cat burgular.

One could argue that many violent crimes occurs in the heat of the moment. Even the Pope might physically assault someone out of rage if provoked hard enough. A robber carrying a piece may have absolutely no intent to use it. A mugger may only intend to grab a woman’s purse, but when faced with unexpected resistance he might throw a punch out of sheer panic. Whereas most white collar crimes take lots of planning, scheming, unscrupulous behavior, and intent. IMHO, that’s scarier than some random punk breaking my jaw for my ATM card. Yeah, there’s a small chance that he could kill me in the process, but we don’t charge criminals for what they COULD have done, but what they DID do. And I’d rather a guy break my jaw than drain my entire life’s savings.

Another distinction that I think should be made and is relatively interesting is that crimes of theft on a blue collar scale that require force to do tend to be acts of desperation. White collar crimes tend to be acts of greed.

Of course, I’m sure we can point to many examples otherwise, but I feel that this is the trend.

Michael McCann, the longtime district attorney of Milwaukee County,
(retired 12 / 31 / 2006 )was best known for prosecuting Jeffrey Dahmer.
McCann had also prosecuted more than ten corporations for reckless
homicide over the last two decades and had won every case (162). But he
did not convict any people. Just the corporations.

One of the things we need is legislation to mandate criminal charges for
“The Reckless Operation of a Corporation”. It needs to include
mandatory jail sentences when the CEO of a corporation t recklessly
operates the corporation and that results in the death of someone.

It amounts to “Negligent Homicide” and it happens all of the time. The one real difference between you and me committing reckless homicide with a vehicle while intoxicated and a CEO driving his corporation is thatt
the courts do not charge our car with a crime. The courts would charge
us. But not so with a CEO and their corporation. Usually, it is only the
corporation that gets charged with a crime., if at all. Not the CEO and
or other corporate exec’s.

The criminal negligent homicide laws used against
corporation’s 162 are not uniform with various State
laws and the laws vary dramatically, from State to State 162 .

Another report that concerns the variances of State laws
(besides 162 ) is:

PRODUCT LIABILITY LITIGATION REPORT
Shook, Hardy & Bacon Law Firm FEBRUARY 18, 2010.
The PDF report is posted at:
http://www.shb.com/newsletters/PLLR/PLLR021810.pdf

While convictions of corporations for negligent homicide are rare,
it has been done (162). Though presently, such “situations” usually result in Deferred and Non Prosecution Agreements. Of which are
usually arranged by way of methods deployed in manipulating health
care with “Tacit Conspiracies” of “the revolving door” and
tractable money trails (MT1, MT2, MT4). It is rather rare, but
on occasion, all of the dots get connects to demonstrate how this
works. One example is an article by the Los Angeles Times (MT3)
about a case that echoes the Jack Abramoff influence-peddling. The
Times reported that a few Congressman combined their influences to
prevent the investigations and prosecutions of am (that is one) of the
S&L banking rip off’s in the 1980s that cost taxpayers $1.6 billion (MT3).

Reference article titled;
Crime Without Conviction: The Rise of Deferred and Non Prosecution Agreements
By Russell Mokhiber Editor of Corporate Crime Reporter December 28, 2005 and posted at
http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/deferredreport.htm

Of which does leave me to wonder how often history might repeat
itself, when such large sums of cash are involved (MT3) ?
Legislation for “Mandatory Criminal Charges and Sentences”
would set a cascading set of events into motion that would ultimately
“Fix The MIC’s” ! It would
simply “jam up” the typical operating procedures of such
“Tacit Conspiracies”.

The prevention of “profit losses” to a corporations stock value is
some thing that I suspect the CEO’s of large corporations do not
want the shareholders to consider, when it comes to legislation with
criminal charges for the “Reckless Operation of a Corporation”.

One of the strategies (and reference material) that I am reviewing
is that legislation for “The Reckless Operation of a Corporation” could
dramatically improve the bottom line profits of large corporations. The
basic strategy is that “it is always about the money”. While the CEO’s of
large corporations take risks in the hopes of being rewarded for raising
profits, they often ignore the consequences because their “personal risk”
is not that much of a factor.

Some examples were documented. Such as the 60 Minutes episode
about the BP Deepwater Horizon Gulf Oil Disaster. The interview with
a survivor and Professor Bob Bea exposes how a BP exec took control
of the operation (after a heated exchange) and took risks that caused
the disaster, in the hopes of making “more profit”.

In reference:
Deepwater Horizon’s Blowout, Part 2 - 60 Minutes - CBS News
http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=6795540n
The amount of money that BP has had to spend trying to clean
up the mess and it’s “liability” could have been mitigated if
not prevented by a law for the criminal prosecution for the
“Reckless Operation of a Corporation”. It is a scenario that
appears to be more that a “common thread” with such “situations”,
after researching this, for over a decade.
(Work in progress with macular degeneration handicap - TK)

Other example extend to our food safety, too.
Search terms:
“peanut butter salmonella criminal charges”
For anyone wanting to help research this:
“Massey coal miner deaths criminal charges”
and
“criminal charges corporation”
You might think that would be a tough case to prove. But the district
attorney that convicted Jeffrey Dahmer also convicted ten corporations
of negligent homicide (162). The reasons why this is so rarely done are
investigated, here.
(Work in progress with macular degeneration handicap - TK)

American Roulette;
It is the red of white and blue collar crime in America.

American Roulette - Red Collar Crime
http://sites.google.com/site/toxicrevelations/red-collar-crime—american-roulette

Partial excerpt:

Revolvers are for Russians.:

In America, we use use products, health care services, BP Oil Rigs
nuclear reactors (y, z), food safety, Safety On The Job and labor rights. Amy thing
that can “turn a profit”, while not being easily recognized
as the life and death gambling for profits with “Red Collar Crimes”.

Additional reference article:

The Next Wave – Call It Red Collar Crime
Published by **Corporate Crime Reporter **32(1), August 3, 2006
http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/redcollarcrime080306.htm

Death Penalty? No.

Locking them up with the common prison population? Oh, hell yeah!

Shoot, I’d even say bring back public flogging just for these guys. And sell it on pay per view.

If we’re going to ressurect this thread…

If deterrence is the only justification for the death penalty (and i don’t think there really is any other justification that can overcome the fact that we will occasionally kill innocent men and those innocent men will almost always be poor minorities) then I can tell you for a fact that the death penalty would be an effective deterrent to Enron type crime. Noone making millions a year risks their life to make tens or hundreds of millions a year and only people who make millions a year are in a position to commit that sort of crime.

Even stiffer jail sentences would have a chilling effect on white collar crime.

Here’s an interesting statistic. The chances of getting caught on audit for things that are not automatically flagged by IRS computers is something like 2%. The penalty for failure to pay taxes might top out at a 40 or 100% penalty and noone goes to jail unless fraud is involved, this is almost impossible to prove unless people try to doctor documents after an audit begins.

Really? I’ve been robbed at knife point and gotten over it, having my life’s saving taken away by Madoff would be much worse.

EWrong.
Madoff destroyed lives, emptied charities, stole pensions and retirement funds for thousands of people. Wealthy people became homeless. Workers lost their savings. It was violence to their lives.That is far more serious than knocking over a party store.

Madoff was sentenced to 150 years. Any party store thieves sentenced that long?

I’ve heard this a lot. It’s cute. But consider that the CEO, though he may have being a lying thief, didn’t use violence. Violence is a legitimately-punishable offense aaginst the public good. The low-class thief isn’t being hauled in just because of the 500 bucks. He’s being sent to prison for whipping out a gun and threatening others.

That said…
I oppose the death penalty for most violent crimes. I do hold it is appropriate for those who violated the public trust, and their punishment should be public. I am not worried about killing murderers as much as I am in favor of executing spies in our government, bureaucrats who break the law for their personal power, and people who violate their office and commit crimes as part of their public “service”. I would not find it unjust to execute Mike NiFong, for example (the prosecutor in the Duke LaCrosse Rape case). I would not find it unjust to execute certain officials in some Department of Child Services, who have been known to use state power to kidnap and sell children, in addition to generally abusing their authority.

Third strikers, sure.Three strikes and you get life. But a party store robber does not destroy thousands of lives at the same time. The financial damage is minuscule when compared to Madoff. But Madoff is not the only one. If you watch MSNBC,s “American Greed”, you see financiers, bankers and investment scam artists over and over.

Zombie-bumpin’? That’s a hanging.

That last point is the keystone of this argument:

[QUOTE=Jonathan Swift]
They look upon Fraud as a greater Crime than Theft, and therefore seldom fail to punish it with Death; for they alledge, that Care and Vigilance, with a very common Understanding, may preserve a Man’s Goods from Thieves, but Honesty has no fence against superior Cunning; and since it is necessary that there should be a perpetual Intercourse of Buying and Selling, and dealing upon Credit, where Fraud is permitted and connived at, or has no Law to punish it, the honest Dealer is always undone, and the Knave gets the advantage.
[/QUOTE]