Poseidon’s Proxy or Plutus’ Partisan: Sentencing Corporations for Crimes against Water and the Modern Day Clash of Titans.

• In Event: Punishing Corporate Crime

Abstract

Modern society mediates its relationship with water through law. The law dictates how much water can be used and how to punish those who overuse or excessively pollute it. On one hand laws like the Clean Water Act have criminal sanctions for excessive and un-allowed pollution of water. However, we also live in a time that demands continued economic growth through our corporations and small businesses– increased water pollution will be a natural consequence. Thus the dilemma: will laws be used aggressively to protect water even if it slows economic growth or weakly enforced to encourage our economies expansion. Using original data I analyze the outcomes of prosecutions against corporations under criminal statutes protecting water completed during the 2004-2013 period. My findings suggest prosecutors levy large fines against corporations that add the largest amount of illegal pollutants to water. However, the fines take up a very small percentage of corporate revenues. Thus laws appear to be weakly enforced so as to promote continued business expansion – not the protection of water from pollution and overuse. In other words, the fines appear to be the cost of doing business – not a punishment for excessive pollution.

Author

• Matthew Greife, University of Georgia