Ostensibly, there is no difficulty in this, the more serious the offense is, the higher the penalty range can be determined, and a higher fine can be imposed in practice, similar to the determination of the penalty range for human beings. However, the fine imposed on a corporation has two characteristics, which make it difficult to determine the high penalty required by the principle of proportionality, even if the acts committed are serious.
The first characteristic is that the fine is paid by the company, but it is its shareholders who are actually harmed by this. Admittedly, even in the case of the incarceration of a defendant, his family members are harmed by it, but in these cases, the defendant, who is serving his sentence behind bars, is the main victim. In contrast, in the case of a corporation, since the corporation is owned by the shareholders, they are the main victims of the payment of the fine. This is the case in general, especially in the case before me, in which the companies were acquired, and the shareholders today are not the same shareholders who would have given the companies the offenses committed, and in addition, the company did not derive any benefit from the commission of the offenses, so it cannot be argued that the shareholders, even the previous ones, benefited from the commission of the offenses. This argument does not prevent the imposition of criminal liability on the corporation, but it must certainly be taken into account for the purpose of determining the penalty range.
Second, and mainly, fines of a certain amount or more may lead the company to insolvency, or to considerable economic difficulties, and then the damage will be caused not only to the shareholders, but also to the company's creditors, its employees, and in the case of a large corporation, to the company as a whole (see Assaf Hamdani & Alon Klement, "Corporate Crime and Deterrence," 61 Stan. L. Rev. 271, 278 (2008) (hereinafter: Greedy and Clement, Deterrence of Companies). According to the defense attorney in the case before me, it appears that in the event that the defendants are fined a high fine and run into difficulties, the factories will close and dozens or hundreds of workers will find themselves without a livelihood. This consideration must be taken into account especially during the period of the coronavirus crisis, when there are already particularly high unemployment rates.