A blend of literary fiction and folktale, Courting Death is a novel about women at the fringes, marginalized women, and women who have been direct targets of gender-based violence. The narrative draws from conventions of traditional African oral storytelling and the conventions associated with western literary fiction. / Master of Fine Arts / Courting Death is a novel.

This study was designed to explore the offers for home repair received at their door by older consumers and the decisions that were made regarding these offers. Deacon and Firebaugh's decision making process was used as the theoretical model for this study. Participants were asked questions about their experiences with door-to-door solicitations for home repair and how they made the decision to accept or reject the offer. The participants in this study were twenty-five older consumers involved in senior groups in Montgomery County, Virginia. Participants were obtained by the researcher at meetings in different parts of the county. A telephone interview was used to collect the data. Demographic data is reported using descriptive statistics. Qualitative analysis of anecdotal data was used to determine themes and patterns in the interview data. Questions about uses of the media and knowledge of the Virginia Consumer Protection Hotline were asked. The results of this study support the idea that older consumers in this county are being approached at their door by people offering them home repair services. Two of the six participants who had received an offer for home repair (specifically driveway sealing), accepted the offer. One participant was unhappy with the outcome of the repair, while the other was satisfied with the service. / Master of Science

Prior research on combating commercial crime has focused predominantly on the responsibilities of auditors and ex post facto forensic investigations. This dissertation aims rather to delve into the meta-theoretical philosophy of commercial crime prevention and the role that forensic accountants can play in this regard, postulating that proactive prevention of commercial crimes is a more effective approach. The BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) were chosen for deeper level analysis, based on their strong growth potential coupled with high levels of commercial crime. While the majority of the research centred around commercial crime prevention strategies for the BRICS countries, a secondary objective was to expand the research field associated with forensic accounting, so as to encourage research into incorporating more preventative strategies. Subsequently, from the literature review and philosophical analysis performed, this dissertation establishes that developing prevention strategies for commercial crime is a philosophical and also a feasible possibility in the BRICS countries. / MCom (Forensic Accountancy), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

Prior research on combating commercial crime has focused predominantly on the responsibilities of auditors and ex post facto forensic investigations. This dissertation aims rather to delve into the meta-theoretical philosophy of commercial crime prevention and the role that forensic accountants can play in this regard, postulating that proactive prevention of commercial crimes is a more effective approach. The BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) were chosen for deeper level analysis, based on their strong growth potential coupled with high levels of commercial crime. While the majority of the research centred around commercial crime prevention strategies for the BRICS countries, a secondary objective was to expand the research field associated with forensic accounting, so as to encourage research into incorporating more preventative strategies. Subsequently, from the literature review and philosophical analysis performed, this dissertation establishes that developing prevention strategies for commercial crime is a philosophical and also a feasible possibility in the BRICS countries. / MCom (Forensic Accountancy), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

The law is stated as at July 2006, before the enactment of the United Kingdom Fraud Act 2006. This thesis covers ‘serious’ corporate fraud and not commonplace petty fraud. I examined corporate fraud, concentrating on a comparison of the United Kingdom’s fraud with that of two civil law neighbouring countries, France and Germany, both with high financial activity, and also with a few American states, common law systems like the English legal system. The objective of this study is to identify ways of combating fraud in the UK by enquiry and discovery as to how fraud occurs and how the two different legal systems- civil and common law- treat fraud. The study reveals factors contributing to corporate fraud and recommendations for combating corporate fraud. Exploring the concept of fraud, my findings are that corporate fraud is facing exponential increase, with the UK government beginning to acknowledge this. I examined the agencies that combat fraud in the states mentioned above including the UK. Although the UK is party to an impressive number of Treaties, which help to combat fraud, treaties dealing with terrorism, drug dealing, money laundering, and other organised crime, corporate fraud is still a serious problem. The conclusions can be summarised as follows. The UK could learn much from the French legal system and the way France prosecutes corporations as per Articles 132, 222, 432, 433 and 435 of the French Penal Code. Germany’s Criminal Code is equally comprehensive in its prescriptive definitions of frauds including corporate frauds as in chapters 8, 19, 2, 23, 24, 25, 26 and 30 of the German Criminal Code. The new UK’s non-codified general, core, offence of fraud, with fraud offences maintained in other statutes such as the Companies Act, likens the UK fraud regulation closer to the US’s with its Criminal Code and other statutes that deal with fraud. The UK has not yet caught up with the US Sarbanes-Oxley Act 2002 as regards electronic business systems’ rules. The USA’s federal prescriptive code for fraud offences is akin to the French and German criminal codes and these are found in US Federal Penal Code Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47, sections 1020 to 1084. Legal privilege is fraud exempt in the United but not in France and Germany. Legal privilege in the UK is partly exempt for SFO investigations and mandatory money laundering reporting.

Casos de fraudes têm ocorrido, freqüentemente, no mercado mundial. Diversos são os profissionais envolvidos nestes casos, inclusive os da classe contábil. Os escândalos contábeis, especialmente os mais famosos, como os incididos nas empresas Enron e WordCom, acenderam para uma maior preocupação em relação à conduta ética dos profissionais de contabilidade. Como conseqüência, há uma maior exigência quanto à transparência e a fidedignidade das informações prestadas por estes profissionais. Esta preocupação visa, primordialmente, manter a confiança de empresas, investidores, fornecedores e da sociedade, dentre outras, na responsabilidade ética do contador, denegrida pelo envolvimento nas fraudes detectadas. Desta forma, o presente estudo teve como objetivo verificar a conduta ética dos contadores e técnicos em contabilidade quando, no exercício de suas atividades profissionais, se depararem com questões relacionadas a fraudes. Para tal, são considerados alguns fatores que podem tanto vir a influenciar o processo decisório ético de um indivíduo, demonstrados através do Modelo de tomada de decisão, desenvolvido por Alves, quanto motivar um indivíduo a cometer um ato fraudulento, evidenciados através do Modelo denominado Triângulo da Fraude, desenvolvido por Cressey. Buscando responder a questão norteadora desta pesquisa, executou-se a análise descritiva e estatística dos dados, com a utilização de técnicas não-paramétricas. Para a análise descritiva dos dados foram elaboradas as tabelas de freqüências e calculadas as medidas de posição e dispersão, através do cálculo dos valores da média, moda, mediana e desvio padrão, quando aplicáveis. Em relação à análise estatística dos dados, foram utilizados os testes não-paramétricos de Spearman e a Regressão logística Multivariada. Os resultados demonstraram que a maioria dos profissionais de contabilidade, da amostra pesquisada, reconhece a questão moral inserida nos cenários, discorda dos atos dos agentes de cada cenário e, ainda, classifica esses atos como graves ou muito graves. Entretanto, verificou-se que esses profissionais de contabilidade tendem a ter um posicionamento mais voltado para a teoria teleológica, uma vez que a intenção de agir é influenciada por alguns fatores, como a oportunidade, a racionalização e, principalmente, a pressão. Alguns fatores individuais também apresentaram influência sob o posicionamento ético dos profissionais entrevistados nesta pesquisa. / Cases of fraud have occurred, often, in the world market. Several are involved in these cases, including the accounting class. The accounting scandals, especially the most famous, such as focusing on companies and Enron WordCom, kindled to greater concern about the ethical conduct of professional accounting. As a result, there is a greater demand on the transparency and reliability of information provided by these professionals. This concern is aimed, primarily, to maintain the confidence of businesses, investors, suppliers and society, among others, the ethical responsibility of the meter, denigrated by involvement in the fraud detected. Thus, this study aimed to verify the ethical conduct of accountants and accounting technicians in when, in the exercise of their professional activities, are confronted with issues related to fraud. This is considered some factors that can both come to influence the ethical decision making of an individual, demonstrated by the model of decision making, developed by Alves, as a motivated individual to commit a fraudulent act, as evidenced by the model called Triangle of fraud, developed by Cressey. Seeking to answer question guiding this study, performed to exploratory and confirmatory analysis of data, using non-parametric techniques. For exploratory data analysis were made tables of frequencies and calculated the measures of position and dispersion, by calculating the values of average, mode, median and standard deviation, where applicable. For the confirmatory analysis of data, were used non-parametric tests of Spearman and multivariate logistic regression. The results showed that the majority of accounting professionals, the sample, recognizing the moral issue included in the scenarios, disagrees the acts of agents of each scenario, and also classifies such acts as serious or very serious. However, we found that these accounting professionals tend to have a position more toward the teleological theory, since the intention to act is influenced by factors such as opportunity, rationalization and particularly the pressure. Some individual factors also had influence on the ethical position of the professionals interviewed in this research.

Small businesses have an important role to play in the U.S. economy. However, employee fraud can jeopardize the sustainability of small businesses. Grounded on Cressey's fraud triangle theory, the purpose of this multiple case study was to explore strategies used by selected managers and owners of small retail businesses to detect and prevent employee fraud. Ten participants from 5 small retail businesses participated in the study. Nine participated in a face-to-face semistructured interview, and 1 participated in a telephone interview. These participants included 5 owners and 5 managers of small retail businesses in the state of Michigan in the United States who have implemented strategies to detect and prevent employee fraud. Through a process of methodological triangulation, casual observations and documentary evidence supplemented data collected through semistructured interviews. Using thematic analysis by coding narrative segments, the research findings included themes of controls and communication, cash register accountability, segregation of duties, monitoring, and action against perpetrators. Managers and owners of small businesses may benefit from the findings of this study by gaining awareness of the need to detect and prevent employee fraud. The implications for positive social change may include the potential to increase appropriate controls over employee fraud, thus enabling owners of small retail business an opportunity to operate effectively and efficiently, which could increase employment opportunities. Increased employment opportunities could create a positive effect on other small retail businesses and allow local communities to prosper.

The economic cost of financial statement fraud continues to be a problem for organizations and society. The research problem addressed in this study was the limited risk management strategies available for the early detection and prevention of financial statement fraud by corporate managers and auditors. These strategies are important to the proactive prevention of fraud. This study is important to future trustworthiness of financial statements. The purpose of this qualitative, multiple-case study was to explore current early detection and prevention methods in financial statement fraud using a risk management conceptual framework. The research question focused on current fraud detection and prevention policies and risk management strategies that are currently used for proactively detecting and preventing financial statement fraud. Multiple sources of information were used, including examining recent financial fraud scandals, interviews, documents, and past research. The target population was managers and auditors of publicly traded corporations. A purposive sampling procedure was used to select 23 participants, which provided rich data. The qualitative data was coded and analyzed using the concept of risk management, along with triangulation to ensure credibility. The key findings indicated that current practitioners are moving beyond the era of reactive measures born from the past fraud crises and are working toward improved financial statement quality and trust. The results of the study also indicated that future research should include proactive methods of preventing fraud. This study is socially significant because it could enhance the ability to trust financial statement reporting in the future and improve corporate reputations.

The financial costs of U.S. federal health care fraud continue to increase, and as health care payments due to fraudulent claims increase, the portion of The Medicare Trust Fund available to pay for legitimate health care expenses decreases. Prosecution is one of several fraud management life cycle components that contributes to and can alter the course of increasing health care fraud; however, despite this recognition, there is a gap in the literature regarding the consistency of prosecution for federal health care fraud across different judicial districts. The purpose of this qualitative, exploratory multiple case study was to explore the federal sentencing consistency across 6 judicial districts in Georgia and Florida during 2011 and 2012 using Wilhelm's Fraud Management Life Cycle as the theoretical lens. Data consisted of publicly available records of 147 terminated federal cases in Georgia or Florida from 2011 and 2012 involving prosecutions for health care-related fraud. These data were inductively coded and analyzed using a content analysis procedure. Findings indicated physical and monetary sentencing inconsistencies when comparing the sentence delivered for similar federal health care fraud cases across judicial jurisdictions. This study promotes positive social change by demonstrating inconsistencies in federal health care sentencing and understanding that consistent sentencing will lead to greater deterrence. Prosecutors and judges will benefit from this knowledge in making more consistent sentencing decisions related to federal fraudulent health care payments.

Univ., Diss. u.d.T.: Sauer, Klaus: Haftung für sekundärmarktbezogene Informationspflichtverletzungen--Frankfurt am Main, 2004.