See my comments throughout your paper and the grading rubric on the last page.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Library Research: Applying Theory to Violent Victimization

Module 1: Assignment 3

Christine Ramirez Maldonado

Argosy University

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Victimization is when a person has been victimized. It is quite clear that the root word of victimized or victimization is “victim,” therefore let’s start by defining that first. A victim is any person who is harmed, injured, or killed as a result of crime. Therefore, victimization or victimizing someone else is an act of making someone a victim. Evidently, a person harms, inures, or kills someone else as a result of a crime they commit. The crime itself can be an act of harming, injuring, or killing someone, but it can also be a consequence of a crime.

The three victimization theory that would explain Carla’s case would be the lifestyle theory, routine activity theory and deviant place theory. I have chosen these theories because I feel it would best explain what and why it had happen to Carla. All three of these theories by definition are related to each other in a way or another. Lifestyle theory claims that individuals are targeted based on their lifestyle choices and that these lifestyles choices expose them to criminal offenders and situations in which crimes may be committed. An example to Carla’s situation would be her jogging to her boyfriend’s place at night even though he lives in a broken-down apartment hidden from the main road. Routine activity theory explains the rate of victimization through a set of situations that reflect the routines of typical individuals such as: availability of suitable targets, absence of capable guardians, and the presence of motivated offenders. This theory explains that the presence of one or more of these factors creates a higher risk of victimization. In Carla’s case, the offenders would know that she routinely jogs to her boyfriend’s house from hers which it allows the offenders to know when and where to commit the crime against her. Deviant place theory states that greater exposure to dangerous places makes an individual more likely to become the victim of a crime. Unlike the victim precipitation theory, the victims do not influence the crime by actively or passively encouraging it, but rather are victimized as a result of being in a bad area. Carla knew that the area where her boyfriend lives is not a great area yet she still chooses to jog there at night. Carla should have avoided jogging there at night time to avoid being the victim of the crime.

In my opinion, the theory that is most relevant to Carla’s case would be the routine activity theory. I have chosen this theory because she had been killed and sexually assaulted and her body was found ten minutes in an area covered with trees, between the main road and the apartment complex where Casey lived. Because she routinely jogged to her boyfriend’s place, it would make her an easy target for the offenders for they would know where to wait for her. There are so many possibilities for Carla to victimize in this situation. The located on she goes to is not a great neighborhood; jogging at night to her boyfriend’s broken-down apartment between a bar where drinking occurs and the building used by probation officers and drug rehab is not a great area for a female to be jogging at night. As a female, you have many disadvantages and crimes committed against you. Areas where crime rate is high should be avoided; areas where there would be drunks should be avoided along with such areas that have constant movements of offenders in and out like the building probation officers uses and drug rehab counselor uses. Comment by Douglas Brinkley: Good selection of theories that are applicable to this scearnio.

I believe the least theory related to Carla’s case would be the victim precipitation theory. Victim precipitation theory views victimology from the standpoint that the victims themselves may actually initiate, either passively or actively, the criminal act that ultimately leads to injury or death. In this theory, the victim unconsciously exhibits behaviors or characteristics that instigate or encourage the attack. Siegel lists job promotions, job status, successes, love interests, and the like as examples of these unconscious behaviors and characteristics. The reason why I have chosen this theory because Carla was jogging to her boyfriend’s place and was showing any behavior or characteristics which may encourage the attack done on her. It just so happen that she was jogging in the dark to a bad area located between bars, building used by probation officers and away from the main road.

I don’t believe that Carla is to be blamed totally for what had happened to her. I think that she had made a poor decision which causes her life. She should have driven her car rather than jog at night time to her boyfriend’s place. I don’t think anyone would have asked to have what happen to Carla to happen to them. There are very many sick people out there. The fact that she is a female puts her at a higher risk of being victimized. I for one would not be jogging at night anywhere and especially to a place where it is hidden from the main road and is located between a bar and a building occupy by probation officer. Such apartment that are broken-down means the rent is cheap, when the rent is cheap, it attracts many types of bad people to live there such as, drug dealers, drug addicts, drunks, sex offenders, etc. She could have avoided it all by having her boyfriend pick her up or driving there herself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

References:

Harper, Laine (August 22, 2014) The Four Theories of Victimization. https://soapboxie.com/government/The-Four-Theories-of-Victimization

 

http://myeclassonline.com/re/DotNextLaunch.asp?courseid=13746222&userid=25779565&sessionid=14af64d02c&tabid=g5vaNuiJdqsMOaMuRVbJ2Nn365/R3jrW2sjL5s7wBKjjGrH8rDI1ssUSqjm88k4E&sessionFirstAuthStore=true&macid=xK721iMxH2IwPDT7dr98nLB2qjgf7D5hErPBuVMeS2R9EYT/V6bXIomnR1adRbx3MPh9aCHqm7usovhkb3QOjag5LdZXJRb5QGfBFxw2vW7lefHCFxu+aG0FhUOTHN2KL2TGwAYKHKNr3ivz5zIgU5gd864/2CsIMVf2Ce7meLYkY31QPKHba2pi5XRgrL7GgaQcCE5ryFkf3gwaCGchRM4QTw6Ww5tIH5dT7cQVahM=

 

Instructor Feedback and Grading Rubric

You did a good job highlighting the circumstances that resulted in the death of Cara and relating the victimization theories presented in class to this specific case. Good use of a variety of resources to support your theory assertions. Your paper was well written and formatted.

 

Assignment 3 Grading Criteria	Maximum Points
Analyzed and explained at least three victimization theories that relate to Carla’s case.	32/32
Analyzed and justified a victimization theory that relates to the case and another that is least relevant to the case.	32/32
Analyzed and justified whether Carla precipitated or was partially to blame for the crime.	28/28
Wrote in a clear, concise, and organized manner; demonstrated ethical scholarship in the accurate representation and attribution of sources; and used accurate spelling, grammar, and punctuation:	8/8
Total:	100/100

Based on your readings, literature, and/or the Fraud Examiners Manual analyze the cases and include the following in your discussion: What type of financial transaction and fraud schemes took place in the Crazy Eddy’s case? Using the *KU library (Westlaw) find a court case with similar facts and compare and contrast these cases in terms of the type of fraud committed. Do you think a regular financial statement audit would have uncovered the fraud in these cases? What do you think should have been done to prevent or deter this type of fraud in these

cases?

3-5 pages (not including title page, abstract, or reference page), Proper APA format, Minimum of 3 scholarly sources (not including your textbook)

David Jacob Levi Chen (a.k.a. Crazy Eddie) – A Financial and Legal Odyssey

 

Eddie Antar, who disappeared in 1989 after the demise of his Crazy Eddie consumer electronics chain, was arrested in June 1992 near Tel Aviv. Antar, 44 years old at the time of his arrest, was discovered by the Israeli police to be living in a luxurious town house in Yavne, a town in central Israel, under the name “David Jacob Levi Cohen.”

 

In 1996, Crazy Eddie pleaded guilty to a Federal charge that he had defrauded shareholders of more than $74 million by manipulating the company’s stock. His plea agreement ended a seven-year financial and legal odyssey, including Mr. Antar’s disappearance and flight under an assumed name to Israel to avoid arrest.

 

In the 1980’s, Mr. Antar and several family members built Crazy Eddie into the largest consumer electronics chain in the New York area. Commercials, in which a fast-talking announcer boasted that the stores’ prices were “insane,” became standard television fare. The company went public in 1984 and, by falsifying its books, Mr. Antar convinced financial analysts that Crazy Eddie was growing when, in fact, it was falling apart. When auditors were on the verge of discovering the scheme, company executives took the falsified documents and threw them in the garbage, according to testimony by the company’s chief financial officer.

 

In 1992, Mr. Antar was convicted by a Federal jury in Newark on 17 separate charges including conspiracy, racketeering and securities fraud. Those convictions, however, were overturned by the United States Court of Appeals. Similarly, his brother, Mitchell Antar, had his convictions in the Crazy Eddie case thrown out. Both Antars ended up with jail sentences: Eddie with 6 years, 10 months and Mitchell with 1.5 years.

 

In 1998, with the financial backing of Eddie’s mother, Rose, his nephews planned to open a Crazy Eddie in Wayne, NJ with hopes of rebuilding the chain. At the time, Eddie and Mitchell were serving time in Federal prison. As a side note: neither Eddie nor Mitchell was expected to be involved in the new venture! Later in 1998, family members Sam (Eddie’s father), brother Allen and brother-in-law were ordered to turn over more than $27 million that they made from the artificially inflated stock between 1984-87.

Bryant, Adam, “Crazy Eddie’s Chief is Arrested in Israel,” The New York Times, June 25, 1992.

Meier, Barry, “Founder of Crazy Eddie chain Pleads Guilty in Stock Fraud,” The New York Times, May 9, 1996.

Foderaro, Lisa W., “Crazy Eddie’s Returning, Minus 2 Jailed Founders,” The New York times, January 20, 1998.

Associated Press, “Crazy Eddie Profits Sought,” The New York Times, July 16, 1998.

The Crazy Eddie Case

Adapted from The White Collar Fraud website by Sam E. Antar at http:www.whitecollarfraud.com

 

Eddie Antar was a retailing revolutionary in his day; he broke the price fixing environment that gripped the consumer electronics industry. To survive in this industry, Eddie circumvented the fair trade laws and discounted the consumer electronics merchandise he was selling. He faced retribution from the manufacturers who stopped shipping merchandise to him. Consequently, he had to purchase his inventory from trans-shippers and grey markets. He built up great customer loyalty in the process and his business volume expanded.

Like numerous other independent small businesses in America, Crazy Eddie paid many of its employees off the books. There was a company culture that believed that nothing should go to the government. Eddie Antar inspired intense loyalty from his employees, most of whom were family. It was us against them – customers, the government, insurance companies, auditors, and anyone else who did not serve the company’s interests. The Antar family regularly skimmed profits from the business. If profits couldn’t be increased through bait-and-switch tactics, the Antar clan would pocket the sales tax by not reporting cash sales.

 

 

The Four Phases of the Crazy Eddie Frauds

1969-1979: Skimming to reduce reported taxable income

1979-1983: Gradual reduction of skimming to increase reported income and profit growth in preparation to take the company public

September 13, 1984: Date of Crazy Eddie initial public offering

1985-1986: Increasing Crazy Eddie’s reported income to raise stock prices so insiders could sell their stock at inflated values

1987: Crazy Eddie starts losing money. The main purpose of fraud at this stage is to “cover up’ prior frauds due to the “double down” effect.

 

 

From the Fraudster’s Perspective

 

Sam E. Antar was a CPA and the CFO of the Crazy Eddie electronics chain in the 1980s when that securities fraud scandal hit. The fraud cost investors and creditors hundreds of millions of dollars, and others, their careers. In addition to securities fraud, investigators later learned that the Crazy Eddie business was also involved in various other types of fraud, including skimming, money laundering, fictitious revenue, fraudulent asset valuations, and concealed liabilities and expenses, to name a few. Since then, Sam has shared his views on white collar crime, the accounting profession, internal controls, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, and other related topics with audiences around the country.

According to Sam, there are two types of white collar criminal groups: 1) those with common economic interests (e.g. the Enrons and WorldComs) and 2) other cohesive groups (e.g. with family, religious, social, or cultural ties). Fraud is harder to detect in the second category because of behavioral and loyalty issues. Tone at the top is crucial here.

Contrary to the fraud triangle theory — incentive, opportunity, and rationalization — Sam insists that the Crazy Eddie fraud involved no rationalization “It was pure and simple greed,” he says. “The crimes were committed simply because we could. The incentive and opportunity was there, but the morality and excuses were lacking. We never had one conversation about morality during the 18 years that the fraud was going on.” He contends that “White collar criminals consider your humanity as a weakness to be exploited in the execution of their crimes and they measure their effectiveness by the comfort level of their victims.” Sam’s description of how the Crazy Eddie frauds were successfully concealed from the auditors for so long is a tale of, what he refers to as, “distraction rather than obstruction.” For example, employees of the company wined and dined the auditors to distract them from conducting their planned audit procedures and eat up the time allotted for the audit. As the end of the timeframe approached, the auditors were rushed, and didn’t have time to complete many of their procedures. Fraudsters use “controlled chaos” to successfully perpetrate their crimes.

The accounting profession doesn’t analyze auditor error, and therefore, learn from it. Sam’s advice to the accounting profession, antifraud professionals, and Wall Street: “Don’t trust, just verify, verify, verify.” Audit programs are generic and auditors have been too process-oriented. Sam recommends that auditors utilize the internet for searchable items, such as statements to the media and quarterly earnings calls transcriptions. A pattern of inconsistencies or contradictions found in these sources of information when compared to the financial statements and footnote disclosures should raise red flags. As an example, Crazy Eddie’s auditors never thought to check sales transactions to ensure that the deposits came from actual sales. They never considered that these funds came from previously skimmed money.

Sam believes that white collar crime can be more brutal than violent crime because white collar crime imposes a collective harm on society. On using incarceration as a general deterrent, Sam says “No criminal finds morality and stops committing crime simply because another criminal went to jail.”