Crimes committed by professionals

Abstract

Preface provided by author:

"MORE MONEY HAS BEEN STOLEN AT THE POINT OF A FOUNTAIN PEN THAN AT THE POINT OF A GUN". Woody Guthrie

The primary aim of this paper is to draw attention to some of the "loopholes" in the Criminal Justice System and to confirm the need for regulating legislation as well as the need to promote a culture of transparency and ethics in Namibia. My secondary wish is to provide recommendations which, in my view, are necessary to achieve true equality before the law for all Namibians, regardless of status and position in society. I sincerely hope that my efforts will contribute to the reform of law in Namibia rather than being seen as mere criticisms of the current system

The general nature of the topic vitiates any attempt to arrive at definite conclusions and serves only as an attempt to highlight the problems experienced in this area of the law, as well as the need for reform

In choosing this topic, it was not and is not my intention to expose or offend anyone. I merely wanted to address what I thought was a major and contemporary problem. My initial research indicated that there had been a considerable amount of work written on the subject of Corruption and I have seen a few articles. Unfortunately, in my view, not much practical action had followed upon the research undertaken and the matter seemed to have ended there. I have therefore decided not to pursue the issue of Corruption, partly because of the apparent sensitivity of the topic and partly because I did not want to repeat what had already been done in the area

For the above reasons thus, I have chosen to concentrate on the subheading of "Occupational Crime" and more specifically, crimes committed by professionals in their professional capacity

I have taken note of the fact that "White Collar" crime and/or "Occupational" crime is not in itself a normative concept, but rather an analytical concept that looks at a broad category of crimes which more often than not find expression in the common law or statute law. Be that as it may, the terms are used herein for purposes of clarity so that the crimes described under the rubric of such crimes are analyzed in a clearer framework and are distinguished from their common law and or statutory equivalents

Further, the use of the analytical terms seems to be an acceptable common practice in the industrialized countries where much research had been done on the so-called "Occupational" crimes. Hence, this paper will attempt to feed into such information and data