Fraud pays: but should it also have a price?

Arie Freiberg Am

Chapter 19 in Research Handbook on Fraud and Society, 2026, pp 358-374 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: This chapter argues that the harms caused by frauds have been insufficiently recognised and that the existing relationships between harm, culpability, and the range of civil, administrative, and criminal sanctions should be reconsidered. In responding to major frauds, courts have given undue emphasis to criminologically unsound theories of specific and general deterrence in the mistaken belief that these would reduce crime, and given too little prominence to the importance of deserts, denunciation, and social condemnation. It argues that attempts to downplay the seriousness of fraud and similar offences accompanied by calls to limit, if not eliminate the use of imprisonment for white-collar offenders, are effectively attempts to diminish the seriousness of such offences, privilege high status offenders and entrench untenable distinctions between ‘violent’ and ‘non-violent’ crimes. It contends that because many of the sanctions currently imposed or proposed are either ineffective or inappropriate, a return to fundamental sentencing principles is warranted.

Keywords: Sentencing; Fraud; Just deserts; Deterrence; Harm; Cost of crime (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781035348800
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