My point is that, as a business, the ONLY duty the corporation has is to maximize shareholder return. If settling has a lower expected cost(including the possible cost of future cases AGAINST THE SAME CORPORATION and the decreased likelihood of attracting talent when it is known that they are willing to risk having them jailed ) then the have a fiscal responsibility to its shareholders to settle.

IN fact, not settling would likely leave them open to additional costs from shareholder suits. Even if the Corp eventually won, the dive the trial would create in the stock price would trigger the shareholder suits.

I guess I really was just pointing out the the system was rigged from the start and the Corp really only has a lose/lose proposition available to it.

The only way it ends is when the government is challenged rather than paid off, like the Sopranos’ insurance. As long as corporations keep making the same business decision, the government will keep targeting corporate defendants and happily take their money.

It’s certainly risky and expensive to fight, but there is also a chance to win and take the government down a few pegs. It’s just expensive to cop a plea, and there is no chance to win. Pick your poison.

So they had the options of paying a lot and hoping they won or paying more and not having the risk.

It wa simply insurance. In that stellar tradition of the Sopranos’ insurance agency.

In other words, Toyota was forced to agree to the deal.

Not at all. Every target is “bullied” in the sense that the government has substantially greater leverage. Not every target cops a plea. Some fight. Some of those win. Some lose. But don’t conflate the difficulty of being a target or defendant with being “forced.”

Toyota made a business decision, which was a far easier one that non-corporate defendants face when looking at substantial prison time. While Toyota may not be as powerful as the United States government, it’s far more powerful than any individual defendant who tells the government to screw itself and goes to trial. So no, they were by no means “forced” to do anything.

In other words, Toyota was forced to agree to the deal.

Toyota could have told the govt to get lost and try the case. Unlike most, Toyota had the wherewithal to defend itself. But like most large corporations, it made a financial decision to take the deal and pay the negotiated $1.2 billion. This is the standard advice corporations get from their white collar criminal defense counsel at Biglaw firms, all of whom are qualified by their experience as federal prosecutors, and who almost invariably advice corporations to cut the deal and not fight.

But Toyota is a big corporation, and knows the game. It could have fought. Instead, it chose to cop a deal. At least it had the financial ability to make a choice.