Dr. Kelly Richmond Pope on Scams, Stories & Secrets

Aug 17, 2023

Dr. Kelly Richmond Pope, an expert in forensic accounting, discusses scams, stories, and secrets behind fraud. She explores what drives people to commit fraud and the motivations of whistleblowers. The impact on victims, the importance of catching small incidents of fraud, and the role of technology in preventing fraud are also discussed. She challenges the misconception that only evil people commit fraud and emphasizes the need for a comprehensive understanding of fraud and its motivations.

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Introduction

00:00 • 2min

Dr. Kelly Richmond Pope's Journey into Accounting and Forensic Accounting

01:42 • 3min

Uncovering the Stories Behind Financial Numbers

04:48 • 2min

Types of Perpetrators

06:36 • 20min

Categories of Victims and Importance of Whistleblowers

26:09 • 17min

Engaging Students Through Field Trips and Real-Life Experiences

43:00 • 5min

Fraud's Impact on Victims, Whistleblowers, and Society

47:46 • 17min

Why drives people to commit fraud? What turns people into whistleblowers? How does fraud impact victims? On this episode, I'm exploring the scams, stories and secrets behind fraud.

My guest is Dr. Kelly Richmond Pope. She's the Dr. Barry Jay Epstein Endowed Professor of Forensic Accounting at DePaul University in Chicago and a nationally recognized expert in risk, forensic accounting, and white-collar crime research.

Her expertise lies in understanding and identifying financial fraud risk within financial statements assessing corporate culture and compliance systems designed to confront internal control challenges.

She’s also the author of a new book called ‘Fool Me Once’, a book that, in her words, "explores what makes perpetrators tick, victims so gullible, and whistleblowers so morally righteous".

It also forces the person reading it to consider their own behaviour because, as Kelly highlights, we are all capable of committing fraud.

In our discussion, we explore:

how she became interested in fraud and the human factors behind it;
why people commit fraud and the fact that we are all capable of fraud
what drives whistleblowers and how not all whistleblowers have the same motivation;
the impact on victims of fraud;
how story-telling can help to reduce fraud and make people more aware of it;
the importance of catching small incidents of fraud to prevent larger ones;
how technology enables — and helps prevent — fraud;
whether fraud is always a bad thing

and so much more...

To find out more about Kelly and 'Fool Me Once' visit https://www.kellyrichmondpope.com/

To read sample chapters of my new book 'Humanizing Rules - Bringing Behavioural Science to Ethics & Compliance' - www.humanizingrules.com

If you enjoyed this episode, do also listen to the episodes featuring Kelly Paxton, who specialises in Pink Collar Crime (PCC), a form of fraud:

Kelly's first appearance on the show in 2020 talking about PCC: https://www.humanriskpodcast.com/kelly-paxton-on-pink-collar-1/

Kelly's second appearance in 2021 talking about how COVID has impacted PCC: https://www.humanriskpodcast.com/kelly-paxton-on-pink-collar/