Blackmail and extortion

SIGNIFICANCE: Blackmail and extortion are predatory and coercive criminal acts that take a variety of forms, all of which use coercion to extract money or property from their victims. The emergence of extortion and blackmail in related acts such as cybercrime and international terrorism represent ongoing threats to all levels of government and corporate entities, individual political or celebrity figures, and private citizens.

Blackmail and extortion are both crimes in which offenders extract payments—in money or property—from their victims through some criminal means, such as threatening the victims with harm, harm to their loved ones, damaging accusations, or revelations of detrimental information. A 1952 case involved a group of offenders who baited men into homosexual situations and actions and then coerced payments from their victims by threatening to expose them as homosexuals at a time when such revelations could have ruined the victims’ lives.

Definitions

Blackmail and extortion are usually regarded as felonies. Extortion is considered to be a more general crime than blackmail and includes the unlawful demand for money that is not legitimately due, often by an officer or other persons in official capacities. Extortion can involve any type of intimidation or threat against victims or those close to the victims. Extortion that is based upon direct threats of physical harm to victims is considered robbery. The threats of harm or violence can be either explicit or implicit.

Extortion also refers to the abuse of official power, in which public officers misuse their official status or authority to take property or money unlawfully. The criminal means and the attainment of money or property are both elements of the crimes.

Blackmail is regarded as a particular type of extortion, in which victims are threatened with the release of damaging or embarrassing revelations that are likely to harm the victims’ reputations. Ransom and bribery are also often considered to fall under the definition of extortion.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) do not include a specific category for extortion or blackmail. However, the National Incident-Based Reporting System defines these crimes as the unlawful attainment of “money, property, or any other thing of value, either tangible or intangible, through the use or threat of force, misuse of authority, threat of criminal prosecution, threat of destruction of reputation or social standing, or through other coercive means.”

Historical Background

Extortion and blackmail have probably been around as long as humans have lived together in societies. Because extortion and blackmail are driven by the abuse of authority, coercion, threats, and illicitly deriving material gain, some form of extortion or blackmail has most likely always attended human society. The books of Matthew and Corinthians in the Bible both allude to Pharisees and tax collectors who use their status to extort money from the people.

During the Middle Ages, church officials were often charged with extortive acts. The Sicilian Mafia grew out of an organized extortion system that supported local chieftains, providing protection for and settling disputes for villagers in return for payments. Some Sicilian-Italian extortionists transferred their practices to the United States when they emigrated from the Old World. Known as the Black Hand, these loosely organized criminals threatened their fellow Italian immigrants with violence if the victims did not pay for protection.

In the modern United States, extortion and blackmail continue to be linked with various forms of white-collar crimes, larceny, robbery, and other related offenses. Extortion and blackmail continue to play a part in organized criminal activities as well as corporate, bureaucratic, and other white-collar criminal actions.

The reluctance of victims to report extortion attempts makes tracking extortion data difficult. Extortion and blackmail can take many forms: from local protection rackets to single blackmailers with damaging photos to organized rings of corrupt police officers. Extortion and blackmail represent crimes of opportunity and abuse of power or advantage. Victims of blackmail and extortion are sometimes forced to continue making payments well beyond the extortionist’s initial demands, as the offenders prey on their victims over the course of years.

In additional to traditional extortion shake-downs, organized shake-down efforts, and official abuse, another emerging threat relates to cybercrime. Corporations and individuals whose vital and personal information is stolen by hackers represent a new direction for this age-old crime. Computer hackers who gain access to and then hold particular damaging or sensitive items of information for ransom are a recent type of criminal to engage in extortion and blackmail. Extortion and blackmail are also used as tools by terrorists who threaten violence and murder if their demands are not met. The use of videotaped and Internet-disseminated threats by terrorist factions represents a disturbing new trend for this venerable criminal activity.

Prevalence

Because extortion and blackmail do not have their own UCR criteria, they are often layered into other white-collar crimes, as well as robbery and larceny. Reliable data for the national aggregate incidence of these crimes are scarce. However, sources indicate the rate of blackmail and extortion is growing, due to the growth of cybercrime.

Extortion and blackmail are global threats, and governments, corporations, political figures, and private individuals are all potentially vulnerable. When these crimes are folded into other crimes, such as kidnapping, assault, and murder, it becomes easier to understand the threat that they pose—not only to individual citizens but also to national and international stability. Because these crimes are based on coercion and fear, as well as the use of damaging information, opportunities to engage in them are limited only by the imaginations of the offenders.

Investigation

The investigation, prosecution, and punishment of blackmail and extortion are hampered by the wide-ranging nature of these crimes. Investigation and prosecution of blackmailers and extorters can be hampered by the victims’ fears. Victims of these crimes may face violent retribution by the offenders, personal or professional embarrassment, or criminal prosecution for their own illicit activities. Furthermore, corporate victims of extortion might face having to make hard choices between giving in to extortionist demands and risking having proprietary or embarrassing information exposed, damaging their financial status and their public reputations. For all these reasons, victims tend to be reluctant to report the crimes and may not cooperate fully with the investigators.

Extortion victims may range from the owners of neighborhood businesses forced to pay protection money to gangs to avoid having their businesses burned to the ground, to international companies making hush payments to keep embarrassing or incriminating information from being made public. In both types of cases, the reluctance of victims to report the crimes or cooperate fully with law enforcement can obstruct the investigative process.

When perpetrators are government officials who are committing extortion under color of authority—such as police officers or prosecutors who abuse their powers for financial gain—victims may be especially wary of pursuing criminal investigations. They may fear that they will not be believed or that their cases will be ignored by authorities.

Prosecution

As in any criminal investigation and prosecution, the elements of blackmail and extortion crimes must be substantiated and eventually proved. These elements include not only the forced payment of property or money, but also proof that the offenders have used criminal means to collect the payments. In cases involving threatened violence, this element can be investigated and proved in a straightforward manner. A pizza shop owner who pays for protection to avoid being beaten or killed, or to keep from having his store ransacked and burned is clearly being extorted. By contrast, a corporation that hides its extortion payments as “settlements” or as business expenses to avoid exposing sensitive or proprietary information represents a greater challenge for investigators. Because extortion and blackmail can take so many forms, from subtle and implicit to overtly threatening, investigators must demonstrate that offenders have indeed used criminal means to extract payments from their victims.

Finally, the crimes of extortion and blackmail are often packaged into other criminal acts, such as robbery, bribery, assault, embezzlement, cybercrime, abuse of authority, and racketeering. Therefore, inquiries into one of these other related offenses may lead to charges of extortion and blackmail that might not be apparent at the beginning of an investigation. Conversely, officials investigating homicides or aggravated assaults must remain open to the possibility that the victims of these offenses might have been perpetrating blackmail or extortion themselves.

Organized extortion, such as that traditionally practiced by the Mafia, can also fall under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, introducing federal jurisdiction into cases that may originate in state or local investigations.

Punishment

Blackmail and extortion are considered either felonies or misdemeanors , depending upon whether violence is threatened or used in commission of the crimes, the amounts of payments sought, and other factors. Federal sentencing guidelines set forth criteria on the different types of extortion, including extortion by means of false accusation, by threats of kidnapping or murder, by sending threatening letters, or by verbal threats.

Extortion attempts for payment amounts of five hundred dollars or less are considered to be misdemeanors under federal guidelines. Punishments under these statutes range from six months confinement for misdemeanor extortion by state or local officer (less than five hundred dollars) up to ten years for extortion offenses exceeding five hundred dollars that also involve written or verbal threats. When extortion is tied to other charges such as assault, kidnapping, arson, bribery, or murder, the other offenses also carry their own punishments.

Successful investigation and punishment of blackmail and extortion depend upon the ability of the investigator and the prosecution not only to establish the legal elements of those crimes, but also to integrate other offenses that are packaged with them.

Bibliography

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