Corporate criminal liability in Morocco : past, present and future

Authors

 

Abstract

The criminal liability of corporations is a major focus of business criminal law. Recently, the role played by legal persons has increased, the scope of crimes committed by them has widened and their forms and manifestations have become numerous and diverse. However, it is fair to say that crime committed by legal persons generally remains more serious and more significant than that committed by natural persons. In this article, the author attempts to study the regulation of the criminal liability of a legal person in Morocco, from its creation to its global approval, before reflecting on the horizon and the means of developing it in a way that is more compatible with the business world and economic crime. For this reason, we have relied on an analytical and historical approach, endeavouring to retrace the historical development of the institution of the criminal liability of legal persons, whether at legislative or judicial level, and analysing it in an attempt to anticipate the future of the latter in Morocco. The researcher arrived at a number of results, the most important of which is that the criminal liability of a legal person passes through three fundamental stages: the stage of implicit recognition accompanied by a denial of this type of liability at judicial level, followed by the stage of explicit legislative approval and judicial recognition, and then the stage of comprehensive and integrated regulation, which has been brought forward by the current Criminal Law Bill, should be approved, which in turn is not without its shortcomings in terms of establishing this type of liability or penalty for a legal person.