NCJ Number
141606
Journal
Crime, Law and Social Change Volume: 19 Issue: 2 Dated: (March 1993) Pages: 103-142
Date Published
1993
Length
40 pages
Annotation
Based on empirical research, this article profiles organized fraud in the Netherlands.
Abstract
The findings are based on information from court files; police criminal-investigation reports, including cases and suspects that were not brought to trial; confidential police information that could be supported by other information; and inland revenue files, land registry, and other written sources. Police investigators were also interviewed. The study encompasses 19 drug enterprises, 21 business crime enterprises, and 6 criminal groups that could not be considered as enterprises or organizations because of their low degree of organization, but which were still interesting as the criminal basis for many criminal enterprises. Organized crime is analyzed within the framework of the enterprise theory, which considers criminals as entrepreneurs trading in forbidden goods or services. Large- scale organized criminal enterprises perpetrate fraud in such business arenas as the meat market, electronic equipment industry, the toxic waste industry, and the stock market. In most schemes the criminal enterprises exploit the price wedge between the cost price and the price due to taxes and government regulations. In the organized toxic waste scams, the authorities are suspected to be heavily involved. Money laundering operations are conducted either by the criminal enterprises themselves or by specialized firms. The research indicates that some "branches" of business crime-enterprises have links with tradition drug- trafficking enterprises. 41 notes and 65 references