SAVINGS AND LOAN FRAUD AS ORGANIZED CRIME: TOWARD A CONCEPTUAL TYPOLOGY OF CORPORATE ILLEGALITY*

Abstract

This paper proposes a classification scheme for distinguishing “organized crime” and “corporate crime” based not on the occupational position or social status of their perpetrators, but on the motives and methods of the offenses themselves. Using government documents, interviews with FBI investigators and thrift regulators, as well as a variety of secondary sources, it documents patterns of crime in the savings and loan industry and demonstrates that these conspiracies more closely approximate organized crime than corporate crime. Included in the discussion is a brief exploration of the other forms of corporate illegality to which this broader typology can be applied. The paper concludes with a discussion of the theoretical and policy implications of applying the organized crime model to certain forms of white‐collar crime and argues that with the proliferation of financial fraud, it is imperative to replace traditional ad hominem assumptions about corporate illegality with more analytically useful distinctions based on the modus operandi.