Each year, white-collar crime costs American businesses billions of dollars. One specific type of white-collar crime is embezzlement. Embezzlement is a topic highly relevant to organizations because it is a crime committed by one of its own employees. Motivated employees, when given the opportunity to embezzle from the organization, will commit the crime. Since organizations cannot control external pressures on employees, specifically financial pressures, how do organizations protect themselves? Implementing internal control systems can minimize organization's vulnerability. The literature review for this thesis explores the development of control theory over the past century. Additionally, the definition of embezzlement is clarified and its relevance to organizations proven. Offenders, organizational structure and size, and industry classification are discussed to determine if a "typical" victim exists. Finally, practical control devices are suggested to prevent organizational victimization. The studies conducted by the author include interviews with law enforcement officers and victimized organizations. The motivation is to develop a prevention strategy for organizations, so that they do not become another statistic.

The crime of embezzlement according to section 206 of Czech criminal code Abstract - Eng. This thesis interprets the crime of embezzlement according to section 206 of the Act nr. 40/2009 Coll., Criminal code, as amended, it interprets qualified facts of the crime which protects owners from breach of the trust they demonstrated for the benefit of a third person in order to enable disposition with their property. The demonstrated trust differs embezzlement from other crimes against property among which it belongs. The essential characteristic of the examined crime is entrustment which relating to the established practices of the Supreme Court means handover of the thing into factual control of the offender. The thing may be entrusted either by the owner, or by the other person who has the thing rightfully in own control. The offender becomes criminal liable when both breaching the given trust and appropriating the entrusted thing. The term appropriation, as the obligatory feature of embezzlement, is not defined by the Czech Criminal code, thus it is one of the essential topics of this thesis. The thesis is divided into nine chapters and these are further divided into sections. The essential chapter is the fourth one as it deals with the qualified facts of the crime. The basis for that chapter is the effective...

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 163-177). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

This study uses the principal-agent framework to investigate the trade-off between the benefits of internal control stemming from a reduction of the losses from inappropriate employee actions and the cost of implementing it brought about by the possibility of collusion that it creates. It is shown that, when the agents find it relatively easy to collude, implementing internal control reduces agency welfare, defined as the sum of expected payments accruing to the principal and the agents, even as, with positive transaction costs of collusion, it improves productive efficiency, defined as the expected output. As a result, the principal, under certain conditions, finds it in her best interest to use internal control as a threat instead of implementing it. When this is the case, the principal sometimes prefers to decrease the accuracy of the accounting information system. The analysis of the agents' side contracting indicates that, even if the principal can prevent explicit collusion, for some values of parameters the possibility of tacit collusion still results in a loss. The study also investigates the effect of the choice of organizational form on the value of internal control. The analysis of two different versions of the model demonstrates that, for a wide range of parameters, creating a hierarchical structure reduces, albeit does not eliminate, the loss from collusion -- i.e., internal control and hierarchical delegation are complementary instruments of organizational design. It is also shown that, when one agent is ex ante more likely to be efficient than the other, in most cases the principal optimally appoints to the supervisory position the one who is less likely to be efficient. As a result, the supervisor, in expectation, exerts a lower effort level than the subordinate and collects higher salary. / text

Thesis (D. Min.)--Western Seminary, Portland, OR, 2004. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 281-295).

Magister Legum - LLM / This paper seeks to examine the relationship between foreign aid and corruption in Zambia. Drawing from the analysis of the two, it then explores whether the existing legal instruments are adequate and effective to combat corruption in the aid context.

Afghanistan a country affected by decades of war and invasions has been subject of democratization and state-building of foreign donors post-2001. Despite the efforts of international community for improvements of state institutions, the country is and has been located at the bottom corruption indexes for many years. This essay tries to understand and explain why Afghanistan has been at the bottom line of corruption despite external actor’s vast democracy aid and building of effective state institutions. The case study of Afghanistan with qualitative method and descriptive text analysis examine causes of corruption in Afghanistan. The materials consist of both statistical data in terms of surveys and scientific literature to provide explanations of corruption in Afghanistan. The analytical framework of the study is based on previous research where formal institutions with focus on political system and informal institutions with focus on clientelism, patronage and neopatrimonialism, are used to explain the empirical data. The findings are that corruption is endemic in Afghanistan, occurring at all sectors of the government and the main reason is the defective political structure along with patronage and clientelistic networks and a state that rest on neo-patrimonialism.

Thesis (D. Min.)--Western Seminary, Portland, OR, 2005. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 136-137).

Thesis (D. Min.)--Western Seminary, Portland, OR, 2005. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 136-137).

Institutional anomie theory (IAT) explains the variation in crime at the societal level by the combination of cultural features, and the institutional balance of power between Economy and non-economic institutions. IAT has had empirical support at the national level as well as within country variation to explain both street and white-collar crimes. This study sought to explore embezzlement trends within IAT framework via the economic, family, political and educational institutions in Japan (1985-2005), a country that emulates some elements of American capitalism yet has strong collective cultural norms that is known for exerting strong informal social control. By converting the original rate data into z-scores the trends were standardized on the same scale, so variations in economic and structural conditions over time on Japanese embezzlement were easier to observe. The implications for IAT were discussed.