three strike rule for corporations

[humbleice]

Okay… so a corporation is a ‘person’ legally, correct? Well many states have a three strike rule, which gives a person a life sentence after 3 convicted felonies. Does this apply to a corporation? If so… how does it apply. If not… why?

[jayjay]

I doubt it. You can’t imprison a corporation. You could imprison the CEO and individual executives, but you’d need to convict them personally.

I’m all for a bit more restriction on corporate charters, but it’s a practical impossibility to convict a corporation per se of anything.

[Exapno_Mapcase]

A corporation is not legally a person. There are ways in which the laws treat corporations in a fashion analogous to the ways a person is treated, but that’s all.

Corporations can file a lawsuit, for example, but they can’t marry or vote or a million other things. And so the three strikes law doesn’t apply.

natural person

In jurisprudence, a natural person is a human being perceptible through the senses and subject to physical laws, as opposed to an artificial person, i.e., an organization that the law treats for some purposes as if it were a person distinct from its members or owners.

For example, such legal provisions as Amendment XIX to the US Constitution, which guarantees a woman’s right to vote, apply to natural persons only. In many cases fundamental human rights are implicitly granted only to natural persons; for example a corporation cannot hold public office, but it can file a lawsuit.

[Nametag]

There’s not a three-strikes law in the country that doesn’t require at least one VIOLENT felony somewhere in the chain. I defy you to find a violent felony that can be committed by a corporation.

[Shalmanese]

@Nametag

There’s not a three-strikes law in the country that doesn’t require at least one VIOLENT felony somewhere in the chain. I defy you to find a violent felony that can be committed by a corporation.

Well, my telephone company regularly fucks me up the arse without my consent… :).

[Diceman]

Corporations have “virtual personhood.” Virtual personhood allows the corporation to own property and file lawsuits. It also protects the shareholders and employees, since lawsuits are filed against the company, not the people.

[Peter_Morris]

@Nametag

There’s not a three-strikes law in the country that doesn’t require at least one VIOLENT felony somewhere in the chain. I defy you to find a violent felony that can be committed by a corporation.

In the UK at least we have corporate manslaughter

[Nametag]

@Peter Morris

In the UK at least we have corporate manslaughter

According to that site,

It is difficult to envisage circumstances in which a company could be convicted of “voluntary manslaughter” (where all the elements of murder are present but the crime is reduced to manslaughter by means of a special defence) or involuntary manslaughter by means of an unlawful act.

Corporate manslaughter will, therefore, normally be considered in the context of involuntary manslaughter by means of gross negligence.

I’m not sure that a grossly negligent act or omission is a felony, even if somebody dies.

[MikeS]

Has the idea of “corporate house arrest” ever been floated? It’s crossed my mind from time to time that just as we deprive people of their liberty for a certain amount of time when they’ve committed a crime, it might be fitting if the government could somehow prevent corporations from doing business for a certain amount of time should they be found to have violated regulations, committed fraud, etc. Would this be unfeasible, or just unpopular?

[Exapno_Mapcase]

There is no legal way the government can keep a business from functioning temporarily. It’s also unfeasible. How would you start the business up again? What happens to the employees in the meantime? The plants, offices, and warehouses? The supplies and their contracts?

The government can bar companies from competing for government contracts.