To: The United States House of Representatives and The United States Senate
Don't Let Big Business Hijack Criminal Justice Reform
Do not allow Big Business to exploit criminal justice reform so that corporate executives can evade prosecution when they break the law.
Why is this important?
A basic, centuries-old tenet of our justice system is that ignorance of the law is no defense.
But Corporate America's puppets in Congress are trying to sneak language into much-needed criminal justice reform legislation so that executives can get away with breaking the law.
CEOs would be able to evade prosecution by claiming they didn't know what the law required of them.
As if it's not obvious they shouldn’t sell defective products or rip people off.
It's great that Congress, in a bipartisan push, is at last tackling ineffective and discriminatory law enforcement policies that have thrown vast numbers of people in prison for low-level, nonviolent drug offenses — at last taking steps to address the crisis of over-criminalization and over-incarceration.
But corporate crime inflicts a horrific toll on our society. And there are far too FEW — not too many — corporate criminal prosecutions.
Tell Congress: Reject any attempt to create an "ignorance of the law" defense that makes it harder to prosecute corporate crime.