Like I stated earlier, the strain theory is best suited to describe why money laundering happens. It states “when goals cannot be met, people become strained, adapt to makes new goals or obtain societal goal of success through other means” (Kearns 2017). The developer of the strain theory, Robert Merton argues that “societies promote goals for their citizens and norms for people’s behavior in trying to achieve these goals” (Kurbin et al.107, 2009). The financial pressure someone may have, can lead them to commit crime. People are raised to believe that having a lot money will help in life. “People experiencing negative life events will experience negative affective states and as a result will be more likely to engage in crime” (Kubrin et al.
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The person committing the crime feels that the “American Dream” is unattainable and turns to deviance to achieve the dream. Deviant behavior is defined as “acting in a way that does not fit in with the norms of society (Serva). It is not always criminal activity, but it can be. Although it is done by unethical means, the pressure society has on achieving a specific type of excellence is what drives people to commit crime. Merton believed that the United States had an unattainable dream because people are not provided with the resources to be successful (Moffitt). The strain theory is seen to be a theory that relates to “crimes of suites” and “crimes on the street” (Langton). This means that anyone can commit the crime, the criminal does not have to look a certain way or have a particular …show more content…
His main motive was to get richer. He just wanted money and wanted to get it anyway possible. He realized that conning people was easy so he took advantage of that. He would launder the money in order to avoid any legal repercussions. Irving knew that by doing this it would be harder to prove that he was in fact, in charge of the criminal activity. Irving did not like that his dad owned a chain of dry cleaners and earned his money that way. This goes back to the strain theory because he believed that he was not going to be able to obtain money through the honest ways of his father, instead he felt that he needed to scam people to get rich. Society puts the pressure on individuals on having a lot of money. Irving felt that he needed to be rich in order to live a “great”
The person committing the crime feels that the “American Dream” is unattainable and turns to deviance to achieve the dream. Deviant behavior is defined as “acting in a way that does not fit in with the norms of society (Serva). It is not always criminal activity, but it can be. Although it is done by unethical means, the pressure society has on achieving a specific type of excellence is what drives people to commit crime. Merton believed that the United States had an unattainable dream because people are not provided with the resources to be successful (Moffitt). The strain theory is seen to be a theory that relates to “crimes of suites” and “crimes on the street” (Langton). This means that anyone can commit the crime, the criminal does not have to look a certain way or have a particular …show more content…
His main motive was to get richer. He just wanted money and wanted to get it anyway possible. He realized that conning people was easy so he took advantage of that. He would launder the money in order to avoid any legal repercussions. Irving knew that by doing this it would be harder to prove that he was in fact, in charge of the criminal activity. Irving did not like that his dad owned a chain of dry cleaners and earned his money that way. This goes back to the strain theory because he believed that he was not going to be able to obtain money through the honest ways of his father, instead he felt that he needed to scam people to get rich. Society puts the pressure on individuals on having a lot of money. Irving felt that he needed to be rich in order to live a “great”