White Collar Crime Newburn 2 007 The study
White Collar Crime Newburn (2 007): The study o f crime focuses on crimes of the powerle ss rather than the po werful itzen E & r e Timn 989): (1 on s y a is alw the s u c Fo s on mes e m i r c cri t o n ts’, . ‘stree e ‘suites’ on th 49) Sutherland (19 coined the term rime’ C r a ll o -C e it h ‘W ut to when setting o e show that crim was not just a working-class phenomena. D Whi efinitio n: te-C o llar C refe r s rim to com mitte offenc e e clas d s ind by mid s abus ividual dles e posi their w who o t orga ions wit rk pers nisation hin onal s for g a expe in at n th s orga nisa e of the e clien tion and / t orga s of the or (Bro nisation wne 2009 )
… s I e m a N My d as e s s a l c e b t What migh ? ’ e m i r C r a l l ‘White-Co Fraud Fiddling Expenses Embezzlement Forgery Collusion (Price fixing) Insurance Scams Tax Evasion
naire o i l l i m , the In 2007 lack (former B Conrad f the Daily o for 6 owner d e l i a j was h p a r g ding u a r Tele f e d fter years a lders out of o shareh llars. o d f o millions com In 2002, World pany in m o c e n o h p le e (T rced to the USA) was fo Billion explain why $4 m it’s was missing fro res accounts. Sha 64 to 20 $ m o fr d e p p ro d rs lost cents & investo millions. Croall (2001): O ften doctors will fals ify prescriptions a nd patient records to claim more funding from th e NHS. One GP made over £ 700, 000 over 5 years doing this. As the definition of White Collar Crime is so vague it can be split into two main types: ime: Corporate Cr ted by Crime commit ainst g a s ie n a p m o c public. e th r o s e e y emplo further d e r lo p x e is (This in a separate Power. Point) Occupationa l Crime: Crime commit ted against a company by a n employee. (This will be e xplored here)
Occupational Crime: Ditton (1977) & Mars (1982) found that many employees (in a wide range of occupations), thought that it was a ‘perk’ of the job & legitimate to steal from their workplaces. > Why might stealing from the office be seen as ok but stealing from someone’s home not be? > How might this be linked to labelling theory? > How might Marxists view this type of crime? > What methodological issues might you encounter if you were to research the extent of occupational crime.
Official Statistics & White-Collar Crime Official stat istics tell us that most c rime is working-cla ss crime. White-colla r crime is under-repre sented with in these statis tics and are thus mislea ding hite. W t h mig y h e be W m i r c r Colla presented r-re unde in official with tics? statis 1) Difficult to Detect ‘Invisible Crime’. 2) ‘Victimless’ Crime. What are the 3) Crime may benefit implications ofall the involved e. g. Bribery. under-representation of white-collar crimes 4) Difficult to Investigate. in official statistics for the view that most 5) Lack of awareness. criminals are working class? 6) Institutional Protection. 7) Lack of Convictions – Middle-Class offenders.
Explaining Occupational Crime Strain Theory Anomie (Merton): & Means & Goals Edgewo (Katz & rk Lyng) The So ciology of Risk Ta king Based on what you have learnt already, can you think of any ex planations as to why occu pational crime occurs? Control Theory (Reckle ss) Market Cu Victimle lture, & ss Crim e
REMEMBER: rime is C r a ll o C e it h W llowing: fo e th to d e k n li > Marxism rime > Corporate C l Crime a n o ti a n s n a r T > een’ r ‘G l ta n e m n o > Envir Crime > State Crime C d e s a b r te u > Comp rime C & n o ti a s li a > Glob ction u tr s n o C l ia c o > The S tics of Crime Statis Based on what you now know about Wh ite-Collar Crime, how do es it relate to the Marxist T heory of Crime?
- Slides: 7