Gender and white‐collar crime: only four percent female criminals

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present an empirical study of white‐collar crime to create insights into perceptions of potential offenders with a gender perspective. Design/methodology/approach Media coverage of individual criminals was used as identification for crime cases, which were then found in court rulings. Findings The paper is based on empirical research of convicted white‐collar criminals. Out of 161 convicts presented in newspaper articles, there were 153 male and eight female criminals, i.e. 4 per cent. Research limitations/implications It is indeed hard to believe that Norwegian men commit 25 times more white‐collar crimes when compared to Norwegian women. Therefore, it is a question of whether the detection rate for female white‐collar criminals is lower than for male white‐collar criminals. Practical implications More attention might be paid to characteristics of female white‐collar crime in the future. Originality/value Rather than presenting some cases and anecdotal evidence, the paper presents substantial statistical evidence to conclude on gender differences in white‐collar crime.