Corporate Manslaughter
What is corporate manslaughter?
Corporate manslaughter is a crime that can be committed by a company
in relation to a work-related death.
The offence is intrinsically linked to whether a director or senior
manager - a "controlling mind and will" of the company - is guilty of
manslaughter.
If the director or manager is found guilty, the company is guilty; if
the director or manager is found innocent, the company is innocent.
Is it difficult to prosecute?
Proving corporate manslaughter has been notoriously difficult in the
past.
This is because the law requires that a director or senior manager is
prosecuted before the company - a separate legal entity - can be
prosecuted.
But it is difficult to prosecute directors or senior managers of large
companies - even though there may be some very serious failures on the
part of the company or individuals - for a number of reasons
including:
· Large companies will often delegate safety decisions to managers low
down the hierarchy or to outside companies
· The law does not impose any positive duty upon company directors to
take action to ensure that their company complies with health and
safety law.
Have any large companies been prosecuted?
There have only been two large companies that have been prosecuted for
manslaughter - and both cases failed.
· P&O European Ferries and two directors were acquitted of the
manslaughter of 192 people who died when the Herald of Free Enterprise
sank off the coast of Zeebrugge in May 1987 after it had left port
with its bow doors open
The trial collapsed in its early stages when the judge ruled there was
insufficient evidence against any director or senior manager.
· Great Western Trains was cleared of the manslaughter of seven people
who died in the Southall Train Crash in 1997.
The Crown Prosecution Service tried to prosecute the company without
prosecuting any individual director or manager.
The court ruled that the case could not go ahead on this basis.
The federal court rejected dismissed Franklin’s case, because Title IX did not allow for monetary relief, The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with the court’s
The school appealed this decision and brought it to the Supreme Court to argue their case on October 12th 1977. The Supreme Court upheld the California Supreme Court's decision with a 5-4 vote. The Court also ruled that the special-admissions program constituted reverse discrimination and was therefore illegal. The Court also said that schools could continue to look at race as a factor when accepting applicants, but they could not set up a quota system or look at race as the only deciding factor.
My homicide case began when the Shreveport Police Department (SPD) received a call from a male caller via 911 reporting he found a body of a black male found in a park near a cul-de-sac in a residential area. I was dispatched and responded to the scene. Upon arrival, I began steps documenting the crime scene. I initiated a rough sketch of the scene and initiated my field notes. A cordon was initiated as I began identifying possible evidence and identifying witnesses and suspects. I canvassed the area and found four 9mm shell casings near the body.
These crimes (Aggravated assault, Non-Negligent/Negligent Homicide) are serious crimes in America and throughout other countries, but in America you would face time in prison for the crime you committed. You have aggravated assault which is crime that it an attempt to cause serious bodily injury to another or it is consider purposely knowingly or recklessly harm to the value of a human life. Then you have negligent homicide which is a crime that it much more less intent, but can be charge if the person causes death towards another through criminal negligence. Last of we Non-Negligent homicide which is way different from Negligent homicide, but it is a willful (non-negligent) killing of one human by another. Out of all these crimes each
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The reason I chose to write about this company McDonnell Douglas is because I felt that what they did was appalling and demonic. They dehumanized the passengers and only seen profit margins. One may say that McDonnell Douglas imps did not know the meaning of the word “solidarity”: Solidarity is a principle of Catholic Social Teaching. This principle means the firm and preserving determination to commit oneself to the common good. This principle incorporates other principles like Human Dignity, Community, Common Good, Stewardship, and Option for the Poor, that is what we are to demonstrate in our actions. This principle does not always come into play with many corporations; Furthermore when things like this come into play, one may say that a company is participating in unethical business practice. This is the reason why an American commercial aircraft industry company named McDonnell Douglas failed to reach their full potential in designing aircrafts. Their lack of ethical appropriate behavior has shown many that the expense of a change of a product is more important than losing lives over something that could have been prevented. There are three ways this situation could have been avoided but yet was not: First, finding an ethical way of putting the consumer long term goals first and increasing profitability (ex. maintaining a good company image). Secondly, look at the short term effect of being unethical, and receiving high profitability and long-term effect of being caught and having to file bankruptcy finally; McDonnell Douglas has an ethical responsibility for the lives of the people who use their product. McDonnell Douglas had a responsibility to the people to provide them a quick trouble free flight to and from their chosen...
Although everyone must explore and be adventurous to find who they are, they should do it in a rational way. In my point of view Chris McCandless was suicidal when he decided to enter the wild. John Krakauer, the author of Into the Wild, led us to believe through the shaved clean cut pictures of Chris that he was going to come home. However, I believe Chris did not intend to come home because of his unreasonable thinking and his unwillingness to prepare himself for the wild.
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The Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI) conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) provides an annual count of fatal work injuries in the United States, including workplace homicides. From 2006 to 2010, an average of 551 workers per year were killed as a result of work-related homicides. In 2010 (the last year for which final data are available), CFOI reported a total of 518 workplace homicides, or 11 percent of all fatal work injuries that occurred that year. A total of 77 of those were multiple-fatality homicide incidents in which two or more workers were killed, including 69 homicides and 8 assailant suicides, all of whom were in work status at the time of the incident. These figures have been brought into public view due to recent tragedies around the country such as Sandy Hook Elementary School (2012), Virginia Tech (2007), and Fort Hood (2007).
Workplace violence is a frustrating issue confronting businesses today. While more data on the reason for violence and how to handle it is getting known, there is frequently no sensible basis for this sort of behavior and, in spite of all that we know or do, fierce circumstances happen. No superintendent is resistant from working environment brutality and no manager can completely anticipate it.Workplace violence can cause many issues for a business, from extra expense, to how to deal with the problem, and prevent it from happening in the future.
Enron started about 18 years ago in July of 1985. Huston Natural Gas merged with InterNorth, a natural gas company. After their merge they decided to come up with a new name, Enron. Enron grew in that 18-year span to be one of America's largest companies. A man named Kenneth Lay who was an energy economist became the CEO of Enron. He was an optimistic man and was very eager to do things a new way. He built Enron into an enormous corporation and in just 9 years Enron became the largest marketer of electricity in the United States. Just 6 years after that, in the summer of 2000 the stock was at a tremendous all time high and sold for more than 80 dollars a share. Enron was doing great and everything you could see was perfect, but that was the problem, it was what you couldn't see that was about to get Enron to the record books.
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for rules and regulations. Ethics is the discipline dealing with what is good and bad and with a
1. Ken Lay served as CEO and chairman and Jeffrey Skilling also served as CEO. They both were responsible for planning, organizing, controlling and leading the company. They set goals for the company and organized how they would be achieved. Kay’s role was as the figurehead and the leader. He also served as the spokesperson for the company and made many of the decision on the future of the company. As CEO’s they both possessed effective communication skills, where decisive, which was evidenced by their vision for the company and refusal to admit wrong even at the end, and visionary. Throughout Lay’s tenor the company continued to grow and prosper at a fast pace.
The American Dream typically involves working hard to build up an organization, maintaining it well, and reaping the benefits. This vision most certainly drove the formation of the energy powerhouse known as the Enron Corporation. The company began as two average sized organizations and within 15 years emerged as America’s seventh largest company. The organization employed close to 21,000 staff members with locations in over 40 nations around the world. Unfortunately, this success was decimated by numerous scandals involved with accounting practices. From lies of profits to questionable dealings, such as concealing debts, the parties involved with running the company had made some fatal errors. The end result left Enron without creditors and investors, leading to the firm to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy (British Broadcasting Corporation, Enron Scandal at a Glance). The story of this once remarkable company is one that can be traced from the decisions made from its inception leading all the way to the much publicized trials that ensued.