The reluctance of the world’s jurisdictions to tackle major corporate fraud – especially when undertaken by pilars of society – is notable. It extends to Japan, where as Financial Director notes:
Three former executives at Japanese camera maker Olympus have handed suspended jail sentences for their part in a £1bn accounting fraud.
Former president Tsuyoshi Kikukawa and former director and auditor Hideo Yamada were given three year sentences, while former executive vice-president Hisashi Mori was given a two-and-a-half-year sentence.
So the moral is, if you’re doing a fraud, make sure you are at the top of the company and make it a massive one. Then you’ll pretty much get away with it.
What a sad indictment of justice that is.
It would appear that large scale corporate fraud is penalised significantly more lightly than, for example, benefit fraud.
What a complete disgrace…
usual story – I imagine Huhne and his ex-wife will get very light treatment and bounce back. There is a lot of respect for class and education in all of this – speak the same socio-economic lingo as the judge and you might find things go better for you.
It’s good ol’ white collar crime. On the Isle of Man it might be worth……as little as a letting off? After the collapse of the Savings & Investment Bank (SIB) in 1982, at the 1990 trial the 75 year old judge decided that it would be a very long trial and the eight years of unwarranted delay had made a fair trial impossible for the eight defendants. So they were all let off.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/sting-in-the-tail-of-manx-bank-crash-report-1552824.html
It seems that here, in any case, the authorities have little interest in prosecuting such matters.
For them criminal is not something you do: it is something you are. If you are not a member of the “criminal class” then nothing you do can be properly criminal. It is all very simple, really…