Effects of bounded rationality on prosecutorial decision making: Analysis of penalties on corporate fraud violators

Our study analyzes data from the Corporate Prosecution Registry of the University of Virginia School of Law and Duke University School of Law. This registry provides information on federal organizational prosecutions in the United States, including detailed information about every federal organizational prosecution since 2001, as well as deferred and non-prosecution agreements with organizations since 1990. We examine a subset of corporate violators, namely those who allegedly committed five types of fraud, namely, accounting fraud, mail fraud and wire fraud prosecutions, health care fraud, securities fraud, and tax fraud. We utilize the framework of bounded rationality of decision making to hypothesize that prosecutors are influenced by internal and external factors that affect the total penalties ultimately levied on corporate violators. Specifically, our results indicate that corporate penalties are significantly more likely to be lower when U.S. Department of Justice sections are involved in the prosecution and the company's country of incorporation has a Free Trade Agreement with the U.S. but significantly more likely to be higher when the violator is a U.S. public company. •Prosecutors are influenced by internal and external factors when imposing corporate penalties.•Penalties on corporate fraud violators are lower when Department of Justice sections prosecute.•Penalties on corporations registered in countries with Free Trade Agreements with the U.S. are significantly lower.•Penalties on U.S. public companies are significantly higher.