Law Commons^™

Comments: The Intracorporate Conspiracy Doctrine, John T. Prisbe

University of Baltimore Law Review

Intracorporate conspiracy arises when a corporation and its own officers, directors, employees, or agents conspire to violate the law. The doctrine of intracorporate conspiracy has posed conceptual problems for the courts, however, because under corporate agency principles a corporation is personified through the acts of its agents and therefore the requisite element of plurality of actors is not present. Notwithstanding this conceptual difficulty, courts have applied the intracorporate conspiracy doctrine in some contexts. This comment reviews the history of the intracorporate conspiracy doctrine and its varied application in the areas of antitrust, civil rights, and criminal law.