When the prosecution of Cotswold Geotechnical Holdings begins shortly, a new chapter in English law will begin. It will be the first case brought under the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007 and it signifies a new approach to prosecuting companies for alleged crimes. The old common law made it very difficult to prosecute companies because the doctrine of identification required the prosecution to pin all the blame on at least one director whose will was identified as the “mind” of the company. The new law aims to criminalise corporate killing without the need to find all the blame in one individual.
The Times