Abstract
The right to bring civil suits against corporations for the damage their activities have caused has long been established in American law. However, the notion that criminal charges can be brought against a corporation is less self-evident, for, as the saying goes, “One cannot jail a corporation.” There is a tendency to confuse crimes committed by one corporate executive for his or her personal gain with corporate crime, or with crime committed by a corporation as a whole. Thus when Martha Stewart was charged and convicted of lying to investigators about insider trading, it was not Martha Stewart, Inc. (a corporation she founded and headed) that committed or facilitated a crime, or was otherwise involved in wrongdoing. Indeed Stewart’s corporation (the share-holders, employees, clients) was considered one of the victims of her crime, albeit indirectly.
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Etzioni, A., Mitchell, D. (2007). Corporate Crime. In: Pontell, H.N., Geis, G. (eds) International Handbook of White-Collar and Corporate Crime. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-34111-8_9
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