Current State of the Responsible Corporate Officer Doctrine: What a Corporate Officer or Other Responsible Official Needs to Know About Environmental Criminal Liability

摘要

To what extent are corporate executives criminally liable for actions occurring, or decisions made during their tenure as officers or directors of a corporation. As the nature of modem business involves complex interconnected relationships between subsidiaries, partnerships, and other entities, the question is more one of how insulated can a corporate officer be from the criminal actions that occur during the stewardship of the corporate officer acting on behalf of the corporation. One need only look to the apparent collapse of the Enron Corporation as the bellwether of public sentiment in favor of individual criminal liability for corporate officers in such scenarios.' Questions relating to how much the corporate officer knew about any criminal wrongdoing are central to a reasoned approach at trying to attach culpability to an executive. However, is it any less rational to associate responsibility with leadership or the wherewithal and access to information such that the officer or director should have known better or should have acted differently.