The 'Right to Control' Wire Fraud Theory Should Be Eliminated

In recent decades, federal fraud prosecutions have relied on the theory that a defendant can fraudulently deprive a victim of the intangible "right to control" its assets, even if the victim is not deprived of any tangible money or property. While this theory has been repeatedly affirmed by the Second Circuit, it is incompatible with a series of recent Supreme Court cases in which the Court has narrowed the scope of federal white-collar criminal statutes by adopting narrow definitions of the term "property."

9 minute read November 01, 2020 at 12:07 AM

By

Harry Sandick and Ian Eppler