Criminal liability of legal persons gives rise to abundant case law on the basis of Article 121-2 of the Criminal Code. A legal person can only be criminally liable for offences committed on its behalf by its organs or representatives.
The legal mechanism of Article 121-2 of the Criminal Code
The condition examined with particular care by the Criminal Chamber is the condition of the organ or representative. The Chamber scrupulously ensures that an organ or a representative is identified as the vector of the fault.
The requirement of an offence committed by an organ or representative
This is illustrated by a decision of the Court of Cassation (Crim., 17 October 2017, appeal no. 16-87249) quashing the decision of a Court of Appeal that had convicted a company of breach of worker-safety regulations and of unintentional injury, without verifying whether the team leader, to whom an omission was imputed, held a delegation of authority in safety matters such as to confer on him the status of representative of the legal person.
While the Criminal Chamber is meticulous on the identification of the organ or representative, it is equally demanding before allowing the criminal liability of the legal person to be set aside.
Concurrent liability and practical consequences
In another decision (Crim., 31 October 2017, appeal no. 16-83683), the Criminal Chamber quashed a Court of Appeal decision acquitting a company of involuntary manslaughter on the ground that the malfunction that had led to the death of a maintenance worker was not the act of an organ or representative of the company, in the absence of a delegation of authority on health and safety from the director, who did not work on the accident site. For the Court of Cassation, the reasoning is short: it should have been examined whether the shortcomings identified in the design and organisation of maintenance rules for the work equipment did not result, in the absence of a delegation of authority on safety, from a fault of an organ of the company, in particular the breach of the obligations of the Labour Code imposed on the employer.
About the author
Maître Charles Bruguière
Avocat pénaliste au Barreau de Paris
Avocat à la Cour, Maître Charles Bruguière exerce exclusivement en droit pénal. Il intervient en urgence 24h/24 à Paris et sur tout le territoire pour la défense des personnes mises en cause.
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