Judges get tougher on white collar criminals

The numbers of ‘white collar’ criminals jailed for Revenue related offences, standing at nine so far this year, including the ‘Anglo Three’, is already three times the number jailed for tax offences in 2014.

Signalling a harder stance being taken by courts in relation to ‘white collar’ crime, figures from Revenue show that, in addition to the ‘Anglo Three’, a further six businesspeople have been jailed for Revenue offences since the start of this year. This compares to three for the entire of 2014 and eight jailed for the whole of 2013. The three jailed last year had sentences imposed from three months to nine months.

At Dublin Circuit Court last month, three former senior employees of Anglo Irish Bank received jail terms of 18 months to three years, with no portion of the sentences suspended, after they were found guilty to trying to defraud the Revenue.