White-collar crime

DOI10.1177/1461355717711453
Date01 June 2017
Published date01 June 2017
AuthorPetter Gottschalk
Subject MatterArticles
Article
White-collar crime: Detection and
neutralization in religious organizations
Petter Gottschalk
BI Norwegian Business School, Oslo, Norway
Abstract
Policing religious organizations presents challenging situations. When there is suspicion of financial crime by white-collar
criminals, secrecy and trust represent obstacles to law enforcement. This article discusses the lack of detection and
neutralization techniques often applied in religious organizations. There may be too much trust, too much freedom, too
much individual authority, too little scepticism, too much loyalty and too little control of the financial side in religious
organizations. There may be no empirical evidence for the proposition that religion has a deterrent effect on crime,
although sociologists and criminologists have long recognized potential links between religious belief and delinquent
behaviour.
Keywords
Law enforcement, policing, crime detection, crime neutralization, religious organization
Submitted 29 Dec 2016, Revise received 03 May 2017, accepted 03 May 2017
Introduction
Tjørhom (2016), a professor of religion at a university in
Norway, argues that in some situations, the Catholic
Church seems to decouple itself from the common moral
and social obligations:
The indictment against Oslo Catholic Diocese was recently
announced. The chief financial officer is accused of serious
fraud, with a maximum possible sentence of six years. On the
part of Oslo Catholic Diocese, the allegation involves a fine of
one million Norwegian kroner ($120.000). Bishop Bernt Eids-
vig avoided indictmentbecause adequate evidenceof guilt does
not exists. Management in Oslo Catholic Diocese hasundoubt-
edly adopted reprehensible methods when members were reg-
istered as a basis for allocation of state subsidies (p. 12).
Norway is a small country with a population of only five
million inhabitants. Nevertheless, suspicions of white-
collar crime occur regularly in religious organizations.
When Are Blomhoff, a Methodist pastor and managing
director of a religious organization, was caught and con-
victed to four years in prison for embezzlement, many
religious leaders were shocked by the news that the defen-
dant had spent the money on parties with prostitutes in
Spain. However, suspicion seldom leads to detection and
prosecution.
This article addresses the re search question ‘How do
religious organizations handle suspic ions of white-collar
crime?’.
White-collar crime
White-collar crime is committed for financial gain within
an organizational setting by deviant behaviour. The motive
for the crime is profit that may help avoid threats or reach
desired goals. The location for the crime is the organization
to which the offender belongs or is associated with. The
criminal behaviour is deviant from normal behaviour
(Benson and Gottschalk, 2015).
White-collar crime is now synonymous with the full
range of financial crime committed by business and gov-
ernment professionals. These crimes are characterized by
deceit, concealment and a violation of trust, and are not
Corresponding author:
Petter Gottschalk, BI Norwegian Business School, Nydalsveien 37, 0484
Oslo, Norway.
Email: petter.gottschalk@bi.no
International Journalof
Police Science & Management
2017, Vol. 19(2) 120–126
ªThe Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/1461355717711453
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