When Fraud Pays: Executive Self-Dealing and the Failure of Self-Restraint

摘要

Fraud is a generic term that encompasses the multifarious and often ingenious means by which one individual can gain an advantage over another through deliberate false suggestion, concealment, or misrepresentation of the truth. Fraudulent acts include the submitting of false claims, tampering with scales and measures, false bookkeeping, tax evasion, and intentionally lying in contractual negotiations. In ethical terms, fraud combines deliberate falsehoods with a conscious willingness to prey on the trusting nature and reliance needs of others; hence, fraud carries strong moral disapprobation. In law, fraud constitutes a defense to a breach of contract action, an affirmative cause of action in tort, and a crime.