NCJ Number
86209
Date Published
1982
Length
5 pages
Annotation
The proposed typology of the victims of white collar crime covers the individual as victim, corporate enterprises as victims, government institutions as victims, the international order as victim, and society as victim.
Abstract
The individual as victim of white collar crime consists of specific persons who suffer harm from an offense, and corporate enterprises are victimized by such offenses as embezzlement and employee theft. Consumers can also be classified as corporate victims when price-fixing and poor-quality goods are inflicted on a large segment of the buying public. Governmental institutions become victims when tax dollars are improperly obtained, such as through Medicare and Medicaid frauds, welfare frauds, and the intentional selling of defective merchandise to government agencies. International order is victimized through such offenses as the bribery of foreign officials by multinational corporations, the illegal involvement of the Central Intelligence Agency in the affairs of a foreign country, and a country's violation of international agreements it has signed. Society itself can become the victim of its own propensities for white-collar deviance, as such a society becomes pervaded by citizen distrust of political and economic institutions, a deterioration of a society's moral fabric, and a tendency to justify all types of crime. The perpetrator-victim relationship in white collar crimes is most frequently based on factors such as the naivete of the victim, predictable delays in the victim's awareness of being defrauded, perpetrator greed, and the perpetrator's gambling on not being caught. Six references are listed.