CFE-Investigation Reviews Questions

Admission-seeking interviews are designed:

“to obtain a legal admission of wrongdoing… also to distinguish innocent individuals from culpable ones and to secure a signed written statement”.

The primary purpose is obtaining a valid confession.

Nonpublic records include banking, tax, credit, phone, credit card, and health care records.

Business entity organisational filings (corporate constitutions, articles of incorporation) are generallypublic recordsand can be obtained from the government.

Therefore, reviewing a company’s business filings doesnotrequire access to nonpublic records.

When preparing for interviews, fraud examiners should avoid scripting detailed questions. Instead, they prepare notes of key points to cover.

From the Fraud Examiners Manual:

“Whenever possible, do not prepare a list of predetermined questions to ask the subject. The interview should flow freely. The interviewer might, however, want to develop alist of key points to coverduring the interview”.

Therefore, the best preparation method is to note key points instead of detailed questions.

For publicly traded companies, the best source for information on officers and directors is regulatory securities records. These records typically include “identification of officers and directors, financial statements, significant owners, and accountants and attorneys”.