Indeed. I think this wasn’t a matter of Apple or the employee paying a bribe, but of the employee receiving one in exchange for stealing hardware from Apple.

I read the story as:

- Head of security team contacts police to get concealed carrying permits for his employees

- Police officer says “if Apple gives us 200 iPads, that can be arranged. On top of that, you’ll get $X”.

- Head of security team agrees, signs of for the Apple hardware, and receives a bribe.

If so, Apple was the only one paying, but the company probably wouldn’t have known about that (possibly, multiple employees would)

If this were the police asking for iPads in exchange for permits, I would call it extortion, not bribery.

> If so, Apple was the only one paying, but the company probably wouldn’t have known about that (possibly, multiple employees would)

If an Apple executive was the one running the entire thing, how is the argument that the company wasn't aware of it? What even is "the company" at this point?

That’s a gray area, but in this case (200 iPads worth about $75,000 versus a company that has a net income of over a hundred million a day, thousands of employees (even disregarding those working in their stores) and top-level execs that, probably, make over $75,000 net every week), I think it’s a safe bet it didn’t go really high up the chain.

Of course, that can change if it turns out Tim Cook knew about this. That would surprise me a lot, though.

Was it for the benefit of the company or individuals? Approved by the board?

The individual was arranging a donation to be provided by the company, which only didn't happen because of the investigation itself. That is, the bribe would have been paid by Apple.

But it probably had no idea that it was part of a bribe. How could it?

This article discusses the two circumstances under which US states may attribute criminal liability to a corporation: https://law.jrank.org/pages/744/Corporate-Criminal-Responsib...

Either of these standards would probably apply to a head of security who commits the crime as part of seeking concealed carry permits for an Apple security team.

CCW is the wrong kind of permit for armed employment. There's a different kind for that. The CCWs would only benefit the individuals, not the company.

Maybe the news article was being informal, or maybe they specifically wanted to carry concealed and not open. It still seems like whatever was being requested was on behalf of the security team he was overseeing as his primary job duty at Apple.

It's possible the journalist was wrong, but I believe the BSIS issues the professional license, not the sherriff. Open or concealed doesn't matter when it's for armed employment - the license from BSIS is what's needed. So it seems this was for personal CCW.

Edit: Never mind. CA is super stupid and requires a state license to carry a firearm for employment but would then also require a license from the sheriff to conceal it.

As discussed in the other subthread, CCW and BSIS would both be needed for concealed carry executive protection in California.

Hence my comment about not minding my comment and CA being stupid.

Who would have to know before you would consider "the company" as knowing it? This was a chief executive doing it

Head security guard is not exactly a ‘chief executive’.

And head security guard is very different from head of security. The laws attributing liability to the company don't only apply to actions of chief executive - Apple head of security would definitely qualify.

I'd say if the company was benefiting instead of just the individuals.

This was to indeed benefit Apple, by arming their security team.

Arming someone for employment is under a different permit from the CCW listed in the story. CCWs would not benefit Apple.

It absolutely benefits them. Nearly all executive protection teams are concealing. There is no public concealed carry of firearms in CA outside your property without a CCW. There is no parallel professional license that will allow you to do so in public. This is part of what lead to this weird situation for Apple.

Concealed or exposed, you need a BSIS license as an armed guard (executive protection) in CA.

No one is debating that, and the BSIS standards are absurdly low and they are available to everyone. There is no taint in the process for BSIS issuance that has been raised.

And this article isn't about bribing for BSIS licenses, it's about bribing for CCWs. So if the BSIS license is the one needed for professional carry, the CCW is moot from the company's perspective.

Edit: Never mind. CA is super stupid.

> Why the company?

Because you don't just randomly cough up a couple hundred anything from a company like Apple without it appearing on the books somewhere.

If it didn't appear on the books anywhere, then it sounds like Apple gave this department a quite significant "petty cash" fund and used this guy and department to do unsavory things so that the higher-ups can have plausible deniability.

Yeah, the company needs to get hammered, too.

Most of these companies do have charity/donation programs. How do you tell which are legitimate vs a bribe like this?

A legitimate "charity/donation" request will get transferred to the "charity/donation" department with appropriate paperwork.

A bribe like this will get buried into somebody's "untracked cash" account.

The problem is that this is "Standard Operating Procedure" for "Security" departments as they're generally ex-police themselves. That's why they didn't think anything of it.

I didn't see the part about it being buried instead of through official channels. Did it have that in there?

If this went to the proper channels it would IMMEDIATELY get flagged for conflict-of-interest.

All these big company "security chiefs" run in the same circle. It simply became known that the easiest way to get your CCW was bribery.

They already got folks at Facebook. Now Apple. They're going to get more.

And I love the quote that this is about the rivalry between "Rosen and Sheriff Smith." As we have repeatedly seen, even when the DA and Sheriff hate each other, the DA doesn't go after the police. If the DA is making a move, the Feds are already involved behind the scenes forcing the DA to move.

I suspect this fell out of some Federal security contract or a Federal security clearance background check for somebody.

The requested permits were for Apple's security team.

As a condition of employment, or personally?

Most states have separate licensing for armed employment.