6 ms·

So forgive me, because I'm a very ignorant person: Why don't we just jail executives responsible if they consistently fail to abide by the law?

Aunche 7y ago
When Amazon didn't include state sales tax in their transactions, did you report your purchases and pay the proper sales tax on them? Millions of Americans didn't and a good number of them knew that they were supposed to. Should they all be sent to jail for failing to abide by a very outdated law?
xiphias2 7y ago
The answer is quite simple: jailing people for fiscal fraud is not that popular among lawmakers for some reason.
- zoobab 7y ago
  Law makers prefer to send people to jail for stealing sandwiches: https://www.huffingtonpost.fr/entry/prison-ferme-pour-vol-de-sandwich-et-de-jus-dorange_fr_5d04ec9ee4b0304a121040bc https://www.huffingtonpost.fr/entry/prison-ferme-pour-vol-de...
  - baud147258 7y ago
    He was already supposed to be in jail.
- frenchman99 7y ago
  Especially in France. Some people are notorious for living in grey areas or unlawfully for their whole life, but never go to jail. And perhaps worse than that, constituents keep voting for them despite.
  - haissam 7y ago
    But not today! https://www.nouvelobs.com/justice/20190913.OBS18406/condamne-a-4-ans-de-prison-balkany-ne-sortira-pas-libre-du-tribunal.html https://www.nouvelobs.com/justice/20190913.OBS18406/condamne...
    - wott 7y ago
      I mean, they had been almost openly doing it for over 30 years...
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
- wodenokoto 7y ago
  “For some reason” does not constitute a simple answer. I’m not even sure it’s an answer at all.
  - close04 7y ago
    I read it as irony/sarcasm. Crimes commonly perpetrated by lawmakers and people of influence are punished very lightly... "for some reason".
AFascistWorld 7y ago
You need to pay hundreds of thousands a year to jail a guy.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
IfOnlyYouKnew 7y ago
First: because it's really hard to pinpoint exactly who is responsible for something like this in a large organisation. Is it the CEO? They are unlikely to know enough about French taxation. Is it the local accountant? That's probably a team as well. Second: Cases like this often arise from different interpretation of laws that are all at least plausible. Companies may tend to be somewhat too optimistic in their interpretations, but it's rare, at least at that size, that they actively try to commit tax fraud. Third: It is the company that profits from the offense, so it's only fitting to apply any sanctions to it. Fourth: Making this criminal law would raise the required standards of evidence to a level where few of these cases could ever be prosecuted.
- stingraycharles 7y ago
  > Is it the CEO? They are unlikely to know enough about French taxation. That's besides the point. If you want to operate in a certain country, you need to - as a business - familiarize yourself with their laws. The CEO is ultimately responsible for ensuring the company abides the law. If the CEO doesn't know enough about French taxation, that's not an excuse not to follow the rules: the CEO should then delegate the task to someone they trust, but ultimately it's their responsibility.
  - esoterica 7y ago
    If a McDonald’s cashier steals from a customer should the CEO go to jail as well? How far do you want to take the concept of “the CEO is criminally responsible for everything their underlings do”?
    - CasualSuperman 7y ago
      Is this cashier giving the money to their manager? No, they're pocketing it. Just because they were on the clock doesn't make it the responsibility of the company.
- MichaelApproved 7y ago
  > because it's really hard to pinpoint exactly who is responsible for something like this in a large organisation. That's usually the case for most crimes, which is why we have detectives investigate them. How do you find a murderer in a large city? You Investigate! Same goes for corporate crimes. Investigate!
rayiner 7y ago
To nitpick: jail is where you hold people pending trial. Prison is where you send people as punishment. That aside: (1) We do jail executives, all the time. (2) The reason maybe you think we don’t jail enough executives is because it’s hard to prove they did anything wrong. The criminal standard for proof is very high: beyond a reasonable doubt. When it comes to “blue collar” crimes, that’s pretty easy to meet. You wouldn’t believe the amount of evidence that exists in a typical drug crime! The defendant tried to sell drugs to an undercover cop; they found more drugs and an illegal firearm in the car; they searched his phones and got extensive evidence of drug transactions. (That is also why so many such crimes result in guilty pleas.) But here the government didn’t win a case. It settled. You settle because there is risk you won’t win at trial. If you have to get accounting experts on the stand to argue about whether the thing that happened is illegal or not, good luck proving that beyond a reasonable doubt. (I don’t know what the standard is in France I don’t expect it’s much different.) Additionally, this is a tax case. It’s a “you put this number under section 3.3(b) instead of 3.3(c).” To secure a criminal conviction in a tax case, you need to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant’s interpretation of the law was not different from the government’s but that no reasonable person would have interpreted it the way the defendant did. Tax positions are carefully vetted and at a large organization like Google you’ll never take a tax position that isn’t at least plausible. Stepping back, the problem is that you’re taking the government’s position at face value. At least in the US, the government prosecutes many cases that are, at best, based on aggressive or creative interpretations of the law. Of course the government says “Google defrauded the tax office.” Of course they have to say that. But dig into some high-profile white collar prosecutions. In the US they’re generally a matter of public record. They often are far from clear cut.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- namdnay 7y ago
  To nitpick your nitpick: that's only the case in America - everywhere else, Jail and Prison are synonyms
  - ferrisford 7y ago

Aunche 7y ago

When Amazon didn't include state sales tax in their transactions, did you report your purchases and pay the proper sales tax on them? Millions of Americans didn't and a good number of them knew that they were supposed to. Should they all be sent to jail for failing to abide by a very outdated law?

xiphias2 7y ago

The answer is quite simple: jailing people for fiscal fraud is not that popular among lawmakers for some reason.

zoobab 7y ago
Law makers prefer to send people to jail for stealing sandwiches: https://www.huffingtonpost.fr/entry/prison-ferme-pour-vol-de-sandwich-et-de-jus-dorange_fr_5d04ec9ee4b0304a121040bc https://www.huffingtonpost.fr/entry/prison-ferme-pour-vol-de...
- baud147258 7y ago
  He was already supposed to be in jail.
frenchman99 7y ago
Especially in France. Some people are notorious for living in grey areas or unlawfully for their whole life, but never go to jail. And perhaps worse than that, constituents keep voting for them despite.
- haissam 7y ago
  But not today! https://www.nouvelobs.com/justice/20190913.OBS18406/condamne-a-4-ans-de-prison-balkany-ne-sortira-pas-libre-du-tribunal.html https://www.nouvelobs.com/justice/20190913.OBS18406/condamne...
  - wott 7y ago
    I mean, they had been almost openly doing it for over 30 years...
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
wodenokoto 7y ago
“For some reason” does not constitute a simple answer. I’m not even sure it’s an answer at all.
- close04 7y ago
  I read it as irony/sarcasm. Crimes commonly perpetrated by lawmakers and people of influence are punished very lightly... "for some reason".

AFascistWorld 7y ago

You need to pay hundreds of thousands a year to jail a guy.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

IfOnlyYouKnew 7y ago

First: because it's really hard to pinpoint exactly who is responsible for something like this in a large organisation. Is it the CEO? They are unlikely to know enough about French taxation. Is it the local accountant? That's probably a team as well. Second: Cases like this often arise from different interpretation of laws that are all at least plausible. Companies may tend to be somewhat too optimistic in their interpretations, but it's rare, at least at that size, that they actively try to commit tax fraud. Third: It is the company that profits from the offense, so it's only fitting to apply any sanctions to it. Fourth: Making this criminal law would raise the required standards of evidence to a level where few of these cases could ever be prosecuted.

stingraycharles 7y ago
> Is it the CEO? They are unlikely to know enough about French taxation. That's besides the point. If you want to operate in a certain country, you need to - as a business - familiarize yourself with their laws. The CEO is ultimately responsible for ensuring the company abides the law. If the CEO doesn't know enough about French taxation, that's not an excuse not to follow the rules: the CEO should then delegate the task to someone they trust, but ultimately it's their responsibility.
- esoterica 7y ago
  If a McDonald’s cashier steals from a customer should the CEO go to jail as well? How far do you want to take the concept of “the CEO is criminally responsible for everything their underlings do”?
  - CasualSuperman 7y ago
    Is this cashier giving the money to their manager? No, they're pocketing it. Just because they were on the clock doesn't make it the responsibility of the company.
MichaelApproved 7y ago
> because it's really hard to pinpoint exactly who is responsible for something like this in a large organisation. That's usually the case for most crimes, which is why we have detectives investigate them. How do you find a murderer in a large city? You Investigate! Same goes for corporate crimes. Investigate!

rayiner 7y ago

To nitpick: jail is where you hold people pending trial. Prison is where you send people as punishment. That aside: (1) We do jail executives, all the time. (2) The reason maybe you think we don’t jail enough executives is because it’s hard to prove they did anything wrong. The criminal standard for proof is very high: beyond a reasonable doubt. When it comes to “blue collar” crimes, that’s pretty easy to meet. You wouldn’t believe the amount of evidence that exists in a typical drug crime! The defendant tried to sell drugs to an undercover cop; they found more drugs and an illegal firearm in the car; they searched his phones and got extensive evidence of drug transactions. (That is also why so many such crimes result in guilty pleas.) But here the government didn’t win a case. It settled. You settle because there is risk you won’t win at trial. If you have to get accounting experts on the stand to argue about whether the thing that happened is illegal or not, good luck proving that beyond a reasonable doubt. (I don’t know what the standard is in France I don’t expect it’s much different.) Additionally, this is a tax case. It’s a “you put this number under section 3.3(b) instead of 3.3(c).” To secure a criminal conviction in a tax case, you need to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant’s interpretation of the law was not different from the government’s but that no reasonable person would have interpreted it the way the defendant did. Tax positions are carefully vetted and at a large organization like Google you’ll never take a tax position that isn’t at least plausible. Stepping back, the problem is that you’re taking the government’s position at face value. At least in the US, the government prosecutes many cases that are, at best, based on aggressive or creative interpretations of the law. Of course the government says “Google defrauded the tax office.” Of course they have to say that. But dig into some high-profile white collar prosecutions. In the US they’re generally a matter of public record. They often are far from clear cut.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
namdnay 7y ago
To nitpick your nitpick: that's only the case in America - everywhere else, Jail and Prison are synonyms
- ferrisford 7y ago