This essay deals with the legal entity’s safeguards in criminal proceedings, with special reference to
its rights of defense. It is based on the assumption that, in the Italian legal system (as in other similar
legal systems), liability ‘ex crimine’ of legal entities is based on the idea of a so-called ‘organizational
fault’, which emerges where there is an organizational defect in the preventive model. Therefore, the
topic of the entity’s ‘exposure’ to liability risk and to the prejudice of its rights of defense emerges with
reference to the so-called ‘risk mapping’ in drafting the model, where the sensitive elements emerged
have the natural consequence of exposing the entity to possible incriminating exceptions. The same
problem of the prejudice of the entity’s rights of defense is also highlighted with reference to the
institution of ‘whistleblowing’, where the need to protect the legal entity could emerge from the
‘whistle’ of the whistleblower. We conclude that both the legal entity’s sensitive documents and the
whistleblower report should be used to improve the preventive model, while their use as a possible
instrument of prosecution in the criminal trial against the same entity should remain excluded.