Financial Crime Investigation and Control

Citation

Vinten, G. (2002), "Financial Crime Investigation and Control", Managerial Auditing Journal, Vol. 17 No. 9, pp. 595-595. https://doi.org/10.1108/maj.2002.17.9.595.1

As one of the individuals appearing in the acknowledgements, I suppose I should declare an interest. Indeed, I was asked to contribute a paragraph setting out my view of the dangers of white collar crime, and this appears on pp. 13‐14. Spencer is my diligent ex‐student and co‐author with me of the Internal Audit Handbook. Jennifer is his wife. This book is reminiscent of the Handbook, but concentrates on this one topic. If politics and religion are not to be talked about, fraud must be a close third as a topic ignored in so many business curricula, and it is certainly not given its due weight as a legitimate business topic.

Liverpool John Moores University used to have one of the few masters degrees in the area, but following a commendation of it in a quality assurance agency report, something I myself was responsible for including, the university promptly closed the course down, and it found a ready home at the University of Middlesborough. Cranfield University copied this six years ago when its equivalent degree was commended by me, and it was shortly retired. I am sure it is a coincidence ‐ other courses I have commended remain on the statute book! It does, however, indicate the precarious nature of such courses, and that they are rarely regarded as mainstream. Even worse is the fact that they do not even manage to infiltrate the mainstream curriculum.

The Picketts’ book is certainly not an academic text, and there are few references to sources and publications within. It is more of a personally inspired and broad brush account of the types and nuances of financial crime, and how to tackle them. Most of it could apply anywhere, although there is a very thin veneer of Americanisation, such as reference to the US Constitution, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the FBI. Even with the broad brush, more could have been said by way of generalisation about legal jurisdictions and the role of police and official investigation services. Bullet and numbered points and short‐headed paragraphs are the norm, and this makes it easy to scan through. The novice will gain considerably from this distillation of practical wisdom, and the occasional brief case study examples.

Financial crime is introduced in the first chapter and this is followed by the presentation of the ’‘stop light” model and Critical fraud self‐assessment. Ethics at work and Whistleblowing and detection form the next two chapters and demonstrate the centrality of ethical considerations. The Fraud response plan and investigations are the next two chapters and this leads to the grand finale chapter on Integrated fraud risk management. Appendices contributed by other authors detail Forensic statement analysis and Data mining.

This is a valuable practical addition to any business library. However, it will need to be supplemented by legal and procedural norms in whichever jurisdiction is in play, since inattention to these can easily jeopardise any criminal investigation.