Online Custom «Did Svoboda or Robles Commit any Crime?» Essay Sample

Svoboda or Robles committed a crime by violating non-public personal information protection law which states that each financial body bears an affirmative and continuing duty to safeguard and respect the privacy of its clients as well as the security and confidentiality of the clients’ non-public personal information. That gives the record-holder an obligation to take the necessary steps to prevent unauthorized use or disclosure of personal information which the record contains. Svoboda, who worked as a credit officer in Rogue bank, was entitled to access the bank’s clients’ information such as earnings, acquisitions, and performance from e-mail and other sources. As an employee of the bank, Svoboda proceeded to disclose the information of the Rogue bank’s customers to Robles whom they would trade securities together. Consequently, Svoboda contravened the privacy law by disclosing information considered personal to another party without the knowledge of the customers or even the bank. In addition, the law required any organization that engaged into a Commonwealth contract to use contractual measures so that the service provider did not act or get involved in a practice that would contravene the International Privacy Principles. That would ensure that personal information disclosed to contractors would be protected so that any action by the contractor could be presumed to have been done by the company and the latter could be held liable for any misfortune. It should be noted that, although Svoboda and Robles had agreed that Robles would do the trading, Svoboda did also trade for his own $800,000 profit, contrary to their agreement. Robles contravened the privacy law by engaging with a third party to use Rogue bank’s customers’ private information for his personal gain without the knowledge of the bank.

Additionally, both Svoboda and Robles are subject to civil liability; firstly, Svoboda disclosed the information of Rogue bank’s customers to a third party, which should be regarded as a case of negligence. The law on privacy Act stated that the disclosure of personal information to others could be regarded wrongful if it breached terms of the contract. Therefore, the contractual terms on which the person presented his/her information was important in the determination of civil liability of an individual. The non-public personal information of Rogue bank’s customers was to be used by the Rogue bank and not by Robles to conduct. As a result, the Rogue bank could file a suit against Svoboda, punishable by imprisonment as well as a penalty as much as triple the profit Svoboda made by disclosing personal information of his customers to Robles without the consent of the customers, for his own personal gains. Secondly, Robles could also file a suit against Svoboda for breaching their terms of the contract whereby they both agreed Robles trading Security Company would trade, but Svoboda went on to execute the trading contrary to the rights and responsibilities of their corporate governance. Svoboda could be punished by imprisonment and a fine. Finally, the board of directors of the Rogue bank could be sued by its customers for their corporate failure to prevent the personal information disclosure. The offence might be sanctioned by the pay to the Rogue bank’s customers to make up for any loss they incurred due to the disclosure of their personal information.

It should be observed that, if any employee, officer or advisor of the company possesses any non-public information related to the company, it is the company’s obligation to ensure that no one takes the opportunity to use the information for the purchase or sale of securities or passes that information to third parties. However, Svoboda could seek to argue his criminal and civil liability as the statements below could act as proof that he did not violate any law related to disclosure of non-public information. It should be noted that possessing non-public information, that is, materials about the issuer of tender-offer securities, but not the tender offer itself, cannot be considered as a vital element of action against the defendant. Svoboda could argue his criminal and civil liability if the court could demonstrate that the person(s) or the company (Svoboda and Robles) making the investment decision on behalf of the employees to either purchase or sell securities, or even cause the securities to be purchased or sold by or on behalf of others, were ignorant of the matter of non-public information. Information could only be termed as material if there was a considerable possibility that a shareholder would consider such information in making investment decisions. Another aspect to be considered by the court in declaring the defendants were not liable was whether those people had been guided by a single policy or a group of policies and concepts that could be termed as reasonable under the circumstances. Nonetheless, the court should take into consideration the kind of action which a person undertakes to ensure that the person investing does not violate paragraph (a) that procedures and policies might include, but not restricted to those limiting the purchase or sale of securities or to those which stopped individuals from accessing such information. It should, however, be noted that two types of transactions had been exempt from the general prohibition, namely the purchase of any securities described in paragraph (a) by an agent or broker representing the offering person and for selling securities put out to tender, an offer to the tender offeror if the offeror is the source of material non-public information.