中文摘要：

文章以沪深两市A股主板上市公司为样本，首次考察了独立董事法律背景在抑制高管犯罪、防范企业风险中发挥的作用及其路径。研究表明：（1）法律背景独立董事能够起到抑制上市公司高管职务犯罪的作用，独立董事的法律背景越多元化、实务经验越丰富，高管职务犯罪的概率越低。（2）较低的高管职务犯罪率一方面是因为法律背景独立董事在任职前选择了低风险公司，表现为信号传递作用；另一方面，具有律师从业背景的独立董事在任职过程中也发挥了积极的治理作用。（3）法律背景独立董事对高管职务犯罪的抑制作用还取决于犯罪类型以及犯罪行为本身的隐蔽性和严重性。文章的研究不仅从微观层面提供了法律影响公司治理的证据，而且对于企业充分利用独立董事法律专长以及监管部门识别企业风险具有一定的借鉴价值。

英文摘要：

Using the Chinese A-share listed companies as the sample, this paper ex- amines the role of legal background of independent directors in suppressing executive crime and guarding against corporate risks for the first time, and further discusses its action path.It arrives at the conclusions as follows： firstly, legal background of independent di- rectors plays a role in restrictions on executive duty-related crime in listed companies, and the more diversified legal background and richer practical experience of independent direc- tors result in lower probability of executive duty-related crime; secondly, on the one hand, lower probability of executive duty-related crime results from the self-selection of low-risk companies by independent directors with legal background, showing signaling effect; on the other hand, independent directors with the lawyer background also play active supervi- sory and governance role in the service process; thirdly, the restriction role of independent directors with legal background in executive duty-related crime also depends on types of crime and the concealment ＆ seriousness of criminal act itself.It not only provides the evi- dence of the effects of law on value for making full use identifying corporate risks of by corporate governance at micro legal expertise of independent regulatory authorities. level, has a certain reference directors by enterprises and identifying corporate risks by regulatory authorities.