I recently had the honor of speaking to a group of accountants at a continuing education seminar. I planned to focus on white collar crime, and in the process of honing a particular topic idea, I selected the topic of “Pink Collar Crime.” I first read about the concept in conjunction with an article about a woman who single handedly embezzled more than $53 million from the town of Dixon, Illinois (home of Ronald Reagan). Rita Crundwell was the town’s controller, and was estimated to have stolen more than $37,000 for every day she worked for the city. She was recently sentenced to just under 20 years in federal prison.
“Pink Collar Crime” is a term attributed to the ascension of women involved in white collar crime. In the 1980’s, when researchers were beginning to look into pink collar crime, they theorized that women rarely used an occupational position of authority to commit crimes and that their motives were need-based. And, in recent studies, despite the fascinating example of Rita Crundwell, researchers are finding that women only comprise a very small percentage of white collar offenders and rarely are the leaders in fraud rings. The only area in which women seemed to yield a high percentage of involvement was in embezzlement cases, and even though women were more likely to be committing acts of embezzlement, males on average are embezzling larger amounts.
One of the leading experts on women and white collar crime, Mary Dodge, a criminologist and professor at University of Colorado Denver, explains that the role of women in white collar crime “remains a controversial and neglected area of criminological study.” I am intrigued by this topic! I discussed federal sentencing guidelines and ended the seminar with a break-out session where we discussed how accountants can put better systems in place for preventing this type of activity in their organization. Please see this link to my presentation materials for further information: (http://www.boortzlaw.com/blog.html).
“Pink Collar Crime” is a term attributed to the ascension of women involved in white collar crime. In the 1980’s, when researchers were beginning to look into pink collar crime, they theorized that women rarely used an occupational position of authority to commit crimes and that their motives were need-based. And, in recent studies, despite the fascinating example of Rita Crundwell, researchers are finding that women only comprise a very small percentage of white collar offenders and rarely are the leaders in fraud rings. The only area in which women seemed to yield a high percentage of involvement was in embezzlement cases, and even though women were more likely to be committing acts of embezzlement, males on average are embezzling larger amounts.
One of the leading experts on women and white collar crime, Mary Dodge, a criminologist and professor at University of Colorado Denver, explains that the role of women in white collar crime “remains a controversial and neglected area of criminological study.” I am intrigued by this topic! I discussed federal sentencing guidelines and ended the seminar with a break-out session where we discussed how accountants can put better systems in place for preventing this type of activity in their organization. Please see this link to my presentation materials for further information: (http://www.boortzlaw.com/blog.html).
| Pink Collar Presentation.pdf |
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