Inside-Out Enforcement

Abstract:     
This chapter for a volume on "Prosecutors in the Boardroom" explores the collaboration between public criminal enforcers and private corporate actors, and some costs and benefits of those partnerships. When the government outsources investigative functions in corporate fraud cases -- such as employee interviews, forensic accounting, and compliance monitoring -- the boundaries between public and private roles can blur. There are advantages to that strategy given resource constraints and the complexity of corporate criminal investigations, but it also tends to exacerbate the piecemeal nature of enforcement. Furthermore, reliance on the private sector imports one of the most problematic features of regulatory relationships into criminal adjudication: the potential for self-dealing.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 23

Keywords: Corporate Crime, Federal Criminal Law, Deferred Prosecution Agreements, Regulatory Enforcement

Accepted Paper Series