Sutherland defined white collar crime as "a crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status in the course of his occupation." His attempts to classify upper-class crime, however, involve only those acts that are no more than petty deceptions and theft. Sutherland's definition of white collar crime dictates that it is an occupational crime committed by a person of high social status. Strict adherence to Sutherland's definition would exclude a high number of offenses, such as crimes committed against insurers and credit card companies, because these offenses are not typically perpetrated in the course of the offender's occupation. Reference to more contemporary writers shows that Sutherland's definition is too restrictive, and others suggest that it has less significance in these more prosperous days. Moreover, some suggest that analysis of white collar crime may focus too much on the corporate offender and make simplistic distinctions between corporate and other varieties of white-collar offending. The greater criticism of Sutherland's definition, however, is its preoccupation with the occupational and class status of the offender. The term "white collar crime" should refer to all financial frauds. Fraud can be described as "the deliberate deception, trickery, or cheating in order to gain an advantage." In essence, white collar crime involves betrayals of trust. It is time to integrate the white collar offenders into mainstream scholarship by looking beyond the offenders' wardrobe and social characteristics to explore the modus operandi of their misdeeds and the ways in which they establish and exploit trust. 23 footnotes