Page 462 - ACFE Fraud Reports 2009_2020

Perpetrator’s Criminal and Employment History
Perpetrator’s Criminal Background
Only 5% of the fraudsters in our study had been convicted of a fraud-related offense prior to committing the
crimes in our study (see Figure 69). This is consistent with our previous data, which show that generally fewer
than 8% of fraud perpetrators have a prior conviction. Interestingly, when we compared perpetrators with prior
convictions to those without, we found no significant difference in the size of their frauds. The median loss caused
by those with prior convictions was $154,000, while the median loss caused by those who had never been charged
or convicted was $153,000.

Perpetrator’s Employment History
In addition to collecting data about prior convictions, we asked respondents to tell us whether the fraudsters had
ever been punished or fired for fraud-related conduct prior to the crimes reported in our study. Only 710 respon-
dents were able to answer this question, but from those who did, we found that just over 9% of fraudsters had been
previously terminated and 8% had been previously punished for fraud-related conduct. Those who had previously
been punished or terminated actually caused significantly lower losses than those with no record of employer disci-
pline. The median loss for those who had been previously terminated was $125,000, and the median loss for those
who had been previously punished was $109,000; in contrast, the median loss caused by individuals who had never
been punished or terminated was $200,000.

Figure 69: Criminal Background of Perpetrator Figure 70: Employment Background of Perpetrator

Other Other
2.1% Charged But Not Convicted 1.7% Previously Terminated
7.2% 9.3%
Had Prior Convictions
5.0% Previously Punished
8.0%

Never Punished or Terminated
Never Charged or Convicted 6.6% 2.9%
6.6% 2.9% 81.7%
86.6%

58 REPORT TO THE NATIONS ON OCCUPATIONAL FRAUD AND ABUSE