Assignment 1: Types of White Collar Crime

Angela L. Langley
LEG 200 – White Collar Crime in Government,
Business, and Labor Professor Thomas Demko
Strayer University
May 28, 2012

Assignment 1: Types of White Collar Crime A white collar crime is illegal and unethical, which violates the public trust. It deals with lying, cheating, and stealing by high profile individuals. A single con can destroy a business, hurt families by cleaning out their life savings, or cost investors billions of dollars. “Devastating losses in relation to homes, businesses, jobs, retirement funds, and college savings were widespread. “It was clear that fraudulent misrepresentations on many levels were at the center of this crisis” (Friedrichs, 2010, p. 1). We will compare and contrast the nature of white collar crime with other types of illegal acts, compare and contrast the typical participants of white collar crime against the participants of other types of illegal acts, discuss the role of technology in white collar crime and how its role may create differences from other forms of crime, and analyze the role of opportunity and how it contributes to white collar crime.
Compare and contrast the nature of white collar crime with other types of illegal acts. The key elements of white collar crimes are trust and its violation. “White collar crimes take on the form of misrepresentation, stealing, misappropriation, self-dealing, corruption, and role conflict” (Friedrichs, 2010, p. 10). White-collar crimes have common characteristics with corporate crime because of the opportunity for fraud, corruption, stealing, cheating, insider trading and other illegal actions. Most white collar criminals claim to be first time offenders when before the sentencing judges compared to other types of illegal acts. Very few white collar criminals are put on trial or sentenced to prison. Most financial crime criminals who are not wealthy, highly educated or socially connected appear in the justice system. The activities that have a close relationship with white collar crimes are: corporation crime, occupational crime, governmental crime, state corporate crime, crimes of globalization, high finance crime, enterprise crime, contrepreneurial crime, technocrime, and avocational crime.
Compare and contrast the typical participants of white collar crime against the participants of other types of illegal acts. A white-collar criminal is a person of respectability and high social status like managers and executives who commits crime in the course of his occupation. They are wealthy, highly educated, and have a social network. They are influential individuals. This does not include crimes of the upper class because most of their cases are murder, adultery, and intoxication. It excludes the lower class criminals who commit financial crime. “Conventional crime offenders are disproportionately young, while white collar crime offenders are more likely to be middle aged or older and to began their offending at a later age” (Friedrichs, 2010, p. 13). Most of the conventional crimes offenders are lower class, poor, male and minority. “American prisons are disproportionately populated by racial minorities, most of whom are in prison for conventional crimes or drug related charges” (Friedrichs, 2010, p. 15). White collar crime offenders have generally been observed as committing only one form of white collar crime, which is seem as an isolated incident without repeating itself.
Discuss the role of technology in white collar crime and how its role may create differences from other forms of crime. Many white collar crimes engage in the use of computers and various technology equipments, which is also a major link of success in defense of these crimes. Computers and electronics are forms of technology, and today, they play a major role in our society. Almost everything is computerized. Technology is expanding and advancing daily. High technology is known as the age of information. “The battle against White-Collar Crime is the exponential growth of technology and the use of computers have triggered a purposeful rethinking of the tools needed by law enforcement organizations to address internet-related crime” (Johnston, 2002).
The rising of the technology has triggered a broad range of illegal and harmful activities, which has increased the rise of identity theft. Identity theft affects everybody and lately, the wealthy has been targeted.
“The use of computers enables people working in certain occupations to use a salami technique that is, to steal small amounts of assets from many sources. Other examples of computer crimes committed by employees include programming a bank computer to ignore an overdraft in the programmer’s account; stealing merchandise by manipulating a computerized inventory bank; stealing computer time to run one’s own business; using computers to extract business trade secrets and then selling them to competitors; and manipulating computer records to embezzle funds from employers or customers” (Friedrichs, 2010, p. 215). The different types of technocrimes are ATMs, fax machines, email, illegal chips, satellites, cell phones, wireless, and etc. Most of these technocrimes are committed by people who cannot be labeled as white collar criminals. Some of these crimes are committed in corporations and occupational settings.
Analyze the role of “opportunity” and how it contributes to white collar crime. Provide specific examples to support your response. The internet has generated a huge opportunities of new threats such as internet scams, which deals with selling products, auctions, investments health products, selling on your own to make a gain, travel bargains, charities, home businesses, and advertising, web based businesses, trading, and many more. “Although many of these scams are enduring forms of contrepreneurial crime, the relative anonymity of the internet can facilitate these crimes” (Friedrichs, 2010, p. 213). For an example, eBay have become a billion business bringing together sellers and buyers in an auction setting. This company started out good and lots of success was being reported about the buyers and sellers making good on transactions. The bigger this company grew, the thieves started to take advantage of the opportunity. This has created a role of opportunity to create more crimes of misappropriation and theft. “For some observers, the boundaries between organized crime (in the traditional sense) and white collar crime are eroding, and may eventually disappear” (Friedrichs, 2010, p. 217). White collar crime is complex and hard to bring to justice due to the difficulties surrounding the concept of the crimes. These crimes affect our economy and society in a negative way by harming the safety and welfare of the people. It also reduces government resources. There is no accurate number or answer to how many white collar crimes have occurred because it is difficult and confusing in explaining the crime. The process is hard and so many wealthy people have gotten away with the crime. “According to one study, arrests for lower level forms of white collar crime (forgery/counterfeiting, fraud, and embezzlement) have not followed a consistent pattern, rising during some periods and dropping during others” (Friedrichs, 2010, p. 46). In white collar crimes, the victims are not aware of the crimes being committed against them than those of conventional crimes. “Some economic costs of white collar crime are clearly direct costs. Arson committed to defraud an insurance company may result in destruction of property of measurable value (again, however, we must differentiate among the original cost of the building, its current market value, and its replacement cost” (Friedrichs, 2010, p. 49). It is difficult to estimate the economic cost of many white collar crimes.

References
Friedrichs, D. (2010). Trusted Criminals: White collar Crime In contemporary Society. Mason, OH: Cengage Learning.
Johnston, R. (2002). The Battle Against White Collar Crime. Retrieved from: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1272/is_2680_130/ai_82012998/pg_3/.