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A comment on Why Aren’t Any Bankers in Prison for Causing the Financial Crisis? (2016). Parent comment

Re:Why Aren’t Any Bankers in Prison for Causing the Financia... by barrkel on Saturday December 16, 2017 @02:40PM (#15941476)
It's fine to use civil fraud for that when the torts can be litigated by the entities involved.

The fact that the government had to come in, and the taxpayer took the hit, materially changes things in my view. That's when the bar needed to shift from civil to criminal.

I'd be happy if laws sat on the book and weren't enforced until just this sort of occasion arose, than the opposite, where we didn't have the laws and can't retrospectively enforce them.

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Re:Why Aren’t Any Bankers in Prison for Causing the Financia... by njarboe on Sunday December 17, 2017 @12:29PM (#15946655)
That is a very bad idea. Basically a dictatorship or oligarchy where those in power do what they want by selectively enforcing laws when they want. "Rule by law" is the phrase used to describe this system, most famously used in China.
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