The meaning of white-collar crime law for companies
Entrepreneurial activity is ever more closely regulated by national and European provisions. Violations of these provisions are often criminal offences. Criminal law terms such as "money laundering" and "whistleblowing" are now part of every entrepreneur's vocabulary. Associated with this development is a professionalisation of the law enforcement agencies.
Specialised investigators – first and foremost the Central Public Prosecutor's Office for White‐Collar Crime and Corruption (WKStA) – are more aggressively pursuing legal violations using state-of-the-art technology. Investigative measures such as house searches and data seizures are now the order of the day.
Any companies could be affected by criminal proceedings – from sole traders to large international corporations. Criminal law has thus moved from a marginal consideration to the centre of good corporate governance.
CMS offers its clients competent, prompt and comprehensive advice on all aspects of national and international white-collar crime law.
Criminal defence: Effective solutions from a single source
Being an entrepreneur means taking risks. Entrepreneurial decisions are sometimes borderline decisions. For example, there is often only a fine line between clever risk-taking and a criminal breach of trust. Bad investments, economic crises, and legal violations regularly lead to investigations.
In this situation, we defend individuals as well as corporate executives and employees. We also defend companies that are prosecuted under the Corporate Criminal Liability Act (VbVG). Another focus of our expertise is the drafting of legal remedies such as nullity complaints, appeals, complaints, and objections.
From our Vienna office, we represent companies throughout Austria and internationally. Our defence strategy always aims to bring the criminal proceedings to a swift end, minimise the consequences, and protect our client’s reputation. We are experienced, discreet, and success-oriented.
Commercial criminal proceedings are characterised by complex interdisciplinary legal issues, are often accompanied by financial criminal proceedings and administrative criminal proceedings (involving fines) and frequently entail cross-border matters. CMS offers you clear advantages here: by belonging to one of the leading commercial law firms, the criminal defence team can speedily, efficiently and cost-effectively draw on excellent legal expertise from the other CMS specialist areas. The seamless cooperation with the CMS Tax Law and Public Commercial Law departments guarantees that defence strategies are optimally coordinated. Cross-border issues are resolved quickly and pragmatically within the global CMS network.
We coordinate the defence, including the media strategy, if the criminal proceedings require the involvement of further defence lawyers (e.g. for accused employees) or external experts (e.g. expert witnesses, IT forensic experts, litigation PR).
Crisis management: fast, practical, solution-oriented
Companies can suddenly be confronted with crisis situations, the management of which requires criminal law competence: house searches, company data seizures, employee arrests, or press reports critical of criminal offences committed by company bodies or employees.
In these situations, we are immediately available to provide you with professional solutions. If breaches are to be clarified by internal investigations within the company, we form an experienced and efficient team of investigators together with CMS Compliance & Forensic Services.
We also advise you on the subsequent criminal "remediation" of violations through “active repentance” (Tätige Reue) or self-disclosure (Selbstanzeige). We also accompany witnesses during interrogations in criminal proceedings as a person of trust (witness assistance).
Preventive legal advice: Tailor-made precautions
In the case of individual entrepreneurial decisions, it may be expedient to obtain advance criminal law expertise in addition to the assessment by business law advisors. When in doubt, the expert advice of reliable and factually competent criminal law experts protects against criminal liability.
Together with CMS Compliance & Forensic Services, we also support you in
- the systematic analysis of criminal liability risks in the company,
- in the establishment of an individual compliance management system,
- in the training of managers and employees in criminal compliance,
- in the optimisation of internal processes in the event of a house search.
Victim representation: Professional enforcement of your claims
Companies and individuals can be harmed by criminal offences committed by employees, business partners or third parties. As victims' representatives, we clarify corresponding facts, file criminal complaints, and pursue the victim's civil claims for damages in criminal proceedings in the context of private participation.
Areas of law
- White-collar crime law
- Fiscal offences law
- Corporate criminal liability law
- Anti-corruption law
- Insolvency offences law
- Accounting fraud law
- Export control offences law
- Securities fraud and market manipulation law
- Environmental crime law
- Cybercrime law
- International criminal law (extradition proceedings)
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