There were not the kinds of scholarships and student aid, there is today. I was very fortunate that, as a veteran, I was eligible to attend college on the GI Bill. It paid for most of my education. I originally wanted to be an astronomer, but had great difficulty with abstract math. So I did a complete about-face and switched majors to accounting because jobs were plentiful and starting salaries were good; it wasn’t because I was enamored with debits and credits.” (Wells, 2011) This is where the CFE started its procedure of becoming where it is today. Dr. Wells had an opportunity to join the FBI as an investigator and his first white-collar crime case was about a young teller who had “borrowed” money from her cash drawer. (Carozza, 2011) Dr. Wells learned very fast that honesty and neutrality were very important in anti-fraud.
Wells states in the interview, “It would be easy to conclude that people, given any opportunity, will turn to dishonesty. Indeed, most internal fraud controls are developed with that thought in mind. But that simply isn’t true. Fraud is a complex tapestry of motivations. What that first case really taught me — which has been reinforced countless times — is that in the right set of circumstances, most people are capable of acting dishonestly. I say this not as a moral judgment, but rather as a simple fact”. (Wells,