The U.S. Justice Department is seeking to increase prosecutions of individual employees for corporate crime and coax companies to turn over evidence on executives after criticism that the government failed to punish wrongdoers in the financial crisis.

Sally Quillian Yates, the department's No. 2 official, ordered policy changes to push prosecutors to reinvigorate cases, according to a memo she issued Wednesday. Under the new approach, only companies that disclose information about individual wrongdoing may be eligible for lesser penalties for cooperating.

“Our mission here is not to recover the largest amount of money from the greatest number of corporations,” Yates plans to say Thursday at a speech at New York University School of Law, according to excerpts released by the Justice Department. “Our job is to seek accountability from those who break our laws and victimize our citizens. It's the only way to truly deter corporate wrongdoing.”