White Collar Crimes Defence Attorney in Columbus
White Color Crimes Carry Significant Penalty
The commonly prosecuted fraud offenses in federal court (bank, mail and wire) all involve “schemes and artifices to defraud.” There does not need to be an actual “loss” suffered by the victim in order for the statutes to apply; instead, an “intended loss” will suffice. Some fraud crimes have maximum statutory penalties of 30 years whereas others have maximums of 20 years. Several years ago, Congress even promulgated legislation to lengthen the statute of limitations of some fraud offenses to 10 years.
The Department of Justice has made the investigation and prosecution of identity theft cases a priority in recent years. Moreover, Congress has significantly enhanced the statutory penalties for these crimes. If a defendant steals a real person’s identity, he might face an aggravated identity theft prosecution, under 18 U.S.C. §1029A. If convicted of this offense, the defendant faces a two year consecutive sentence for each count on top of any sentence that would be imposed for any other substantive violation of federal law.
Our attorneys are experienced in many types of white collar crime cases, including: