Organised Crime & Crime Prevention - what works? - Scandinavian ...

NSfK’s 40. forskerseminar, Espoo, Finland 1998
toes“, and as a result there has been systematic attempts to make the tax authorities seem as
“bad“.9 In fact an audit was made by the state´s audit unit into the actions of tax authorities
(Control of control!). The result of the inspection was that the entrepreneurs claims were
wrong.
If a person feels that she has experienced that she has been treated in an unjust manner by the
police there are three possible methods of reaction. One can press criminal charges, one can
sue for civil damages or lodge a compaint.10 The general notion11 of police who are dealing
with white collar crime is that the use of all posible legal mechanisms has increased in the
past few years, and in particular they are used much more by white collar criminals the
traditional criminals.
In the case study I conducted, the accused was charged of offences agains banktrupcy law: via
complicated arrangements he had made 1,5 million marks dissapear. He undertook legal
actions against 20 people that were somehow connected to the case. He lodged complaints,
pressed criminal charges and sued for civil damages. He claimed that the person in charge of
the investigation had harrased him, caused unnneccecary suffering, comitted slander, denied
him legal aid, kept him in detention too long. He had similar complaints agains the investigators
in the case and the prisonguards. He also claimed that the tax auditor had acted illegally.
Furthermore, he claimed that the two administrators of his estate and their lawyers had given
false statements. In his opinion even the bank manager who demanded that his business
should be adjudicated in banktrupcy had made himself guilty of something. The general
attitude of the defendant is quite clearly, that he was extremely angry that his actions were
questionned in any manner, and that he had been subjected to being treated as some kind of
“criminal“.
“It is clear that the police see that going bancrupt is a crime in itself...I have done
nothing criminal and the police are desperatly trying to find something illegal in my actions“
The more public figures often see that they are selected and subjected to control measures
only because of who they are and that otherwise no attention would have been paid to similar
actions. An ex-minister who was suspected of participating in land flips (the value of an estate
rose from 12,5 million to 18 million in one day!) said:
“I was a normal customer of the bank and the only reason my actions are condemnd
is because of my name. What I did was only rearranging my financial matters, and I didn´t
know anything about the internal problems of the bank...and the prices of estates change so
rapidly.“12
3.2. Police
9 Helsingin Sanomat 23.2.1997. p.D2.
10 Lodging a complaint is a pecualiarity in the Finnish legal system. There is no due form to draft it, there are no
time limits and one can complain of any actions of any state authority. The supervising authority must always
look into it and give a statement. The highest official of these compaints is the parlaments legal ombudsman, who
has the power to give (punitive) admonitions. Originally the complaint was designed to secure the legal rights of
uneducated people.
11 According to the questionnare I made, 80 % of white collar crime investigators knew cases where such
mechanisms had been used.
12 Kauppalehti 24.9.97.
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