Jacqueline Arango and Scott Marrs commented on the final Forbes column looking into the criminalization of corporate executives titled, “Avoiding Unwarranted Prosection.” The last of three columns outlines the steps that companies should take to protect themselves from the dangers of unwarranted criminal litigation.
Arango, who serves as Co-Chair of Akerman’s White Collar Crime and Government Investigations Practice, shared her perspective as a white collar defense lawyer, “The convoluted web of rules and regulations to which businesses must comply means that even the most conscientious of companies encounters compliance issues. Maintaining compliance is an all-consuming job for a corporate general counsel’s office.”
Marrs, managing partner of Akerman’s Texas offices, noted that the Department of Justice and other agencies have become increasingly aggressive by expanding their definitions of criminal liability, therefore diminishing the role of intent in white collar prosecutions and dismissing the utility of voluntary corporate compliance programs.