White Collar Crimes Explained

The term "white-collar crimes" has been in use since 1939, when it was created by Edwin Sutherland while he was delivering a speech to the American Sociological Society (Cornell, 2005). The definition of white-collar crimes was originally defined by Sutherland as "crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status in the course of his occupation" (Cornell, 2005, Para. 1). Today, through much debate, the term is generally applied to any form of various nonviolent offenses that are committed in a business or professional setting for capital gains. One way a person might be able to distinguish between a white-collar crime and simple theft, is that a white-collar crime is not a direct form of theft. Most of the individuals who participate in such crimes feel that their actions are okay as long as there is no direct victim (Fraud, 2004). These crimes are hard to solve as the offenders are very organized and know exactly what needs to be concealed and essentially cover their tracks. There are three major factors that may be present when an individual is developing a scheme for white collar crimes:

• Motive - usually financial hardships in personal life
• Opportunity - lack of strict accounting procedures
• Ethics and Morals of the employees (Fraud, 2004).

There are many forms of white-collar crimes that have been practiced. The various forms of white-collar crimes range from bribery to embezzlement to counterfeiting (White Collar, 2006). Along with the various forms of white-collar crimes, there are different schemes that may be used in order to commit the offense. One form of white-collar crime would be investment schemes. These types of schemes are committed when a perpetrator contacts a naïve victim who makes a promise to the victim that there will be a large return on a very small investment (White Collar, 2006). An example of a real-life investment scheme would be the West African Investment Scams. The individuals involved in this scam would target businesses and upon receiving the bank account information for the businesses would withdraw all of the funds (White Collar, 2006).