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Hush money is a form of bribery used to ensure a person’s silence or discretion, often used to cover up illegal or unethical acts. The recipient may be offended by the offer and report the activity to authorities or become blackmail themselves. The threat of imprisonment or heavy fines may outweigh the benefits of silence.
As the old saying goes, three people can keep a secret until two of them are dead. Another method of ensuring a person’s silence or discretion is a form of bribery known as hush money. A corrupt politician might offer money to a staff member who discovers an illegal bribe, for example. The amount of money should be substantial enough to convince the other party to keep quiet about the incident or suffer selective memory loss if challenged.
Hush money is rarely identified as such, because acknowledging the offer of a bribe in exchange for a witness’ silence could also be construed as criminal activity. Instead, the guilty or embarrassed party could qualify the cash payment as an employee performance bonus, short-term loan, or generous, unconditional gift. The recipient of such hush-hush funds is expected to remain discreet about the real reasons for the sudden largesse or tampering. Hush money is often transferred in very private circumstances, and generally with little or no paper trail.
Offering money to cover an illegal or unethical act can be a very sensitive proposition for the offender. Another interested party could offer the recipient even more money in exchange for the information they still hold. The recipient may be offended by the indecent offer to buy their own silence and still report the activity to the authorities or other interested parties. A recipient of hush money may also decide they need additional funds to remain silent. Thus, the recipient of silence can easily become blackmail in its own right.
Submitted money is often used to keep an illegal act or shameful secret hidden from public scrutiny in the media or private scrutiny involving employers or family members. An unfaithful husband may offer sums of money in order, for example, to prevent news of the affair from reaching his spouse. A drug-addicted celebrity may offer her personal assistant a silence to prevent the media from publicizing her behavior, or a corrupt politician may offer a silence for a staff member witnessing a leak.
All such offenders must believe that they have offered sufficient financial incentives for the recipient to remain silent, regardless of who may question them later. Quite often, however, the threat of imprisonment or heavy fines outweighs the benefits provided by silence, and the recipient becomes much more willing to reveal what he or she knows to the proper authorities. This is the greatest risk one takes when dealing with silence or other methods used to buy a person’s silence.
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