NCJ Number
88365
Journal
Criminologie Volume: 15 Issue: 1 Dated: (1982) Pages: 77-104
Date Published
1982
Length
28 pages
Annotation
Canadian legal sanctions against white collar crime and the application of corporate liability to criminality in big businesses are weak in comparison to corporate economic power and its potential for abuse.
Abstract
An analysis of Canadian laws applicable to corporate entities delineates the types of penalties that can be imposed. Fines are the dominant form of sanction for illicit organizational activity. Other possible penalties are restitution and neutralization (dissolution of the organization, i.e., revocation of its license). The gradation of penalties according to offense seriousness applies principally to the amounts of fines imposed. In criminal cases, the size of fines imposed upon corporate entities is essentially determined by judicial discretion. The extent of this discretionary power is so broad that knowledge of the law will not provide an offending corporation any inkling of how severe or light the eventual penalty may be. More specific amounts are cited for penalties under which a fine is to be substituted for a prison sentence when applied to a corporate entity. Only one-third of the statutory provisions quoting specific fines for particular offenses apply to the kinds of infractions that corporate entities can commit. Footnotes, tabular data, and 14 references are given.