Fraud Steals estimated $87 Billion from Insurers: Real Cases Underline Duplicity.

• Author: Zalma, Barry

Insurance fraud continually takes more money each year than it did the last from the insurance buying public. There is no certain number. Most attempts at insurance fraud succeed. Estimates of the extent of insurance fraud in the United States range from $87 billion to more than $300 billion every year.

Insurers and government backed pseudo-insurers like Medicare, Medicaid, the National Flood Insurance Program and the crop insurance programs, can only estimate the extent they lose to fraudulent claims. Lack of sufficient investigation and prosecution of insurance criminals is endemic. Most insurance fraud criminals are not detected. Those that are detected do so because they became greedy, sloppy and unprofessional so that the attempted fraud becomes so obvious it cannot be ignored.

Almost every state, by statute, requires that insurers have Special Investigation Units (SIU) to investigate potential insurance fraud and present their suspicions to state officials. It sounds good but results in few convictions. Arrests mean nothing, only convictions deter those who are considering insurance fraud.

This column will only report convictions.

MOTHER & DAUGHTER GUILTY OF FRAUD

Manjit K. Singh, 48, and Harpneet K. Bath, 27, both pleaded guilty on March 23, 2020 to a single count each of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. The guilty pleas come in the wake of a March 19 indictment by a Greenup County, Kentucky grand jury. Singh's husband, 50-year-old Gurpreet Singh Bath, was also charged of conspiracy to commit arson charge.

Authorities alleged the two tried to hire a man to burn down Wolf's Food Mart and Pool Hall in order to collect up to a $275,000 insurance pay-out. The man they hired turned out to be an informant.

Singh, according to the plea agreement, offered the informant $5,000 to burn down the store because they could no longer afford to run it. She then gave the informant a tour of the store to show him how she wanted it torched and a $100 towards a $1,000 down payment on the arson. Bath traveled from Canada to deliver the other $900 in cash to the informant and to help her mother move up there.

The plea agreement states the wire fraud charge stems from the fact the insurance claim would have been submitted by fax or telephone through interstate wires. While his initials are in the plea agreements, federal records do not show Gurpreet Bath as being charged.

The two women will face up to 20 years in prison and not more than $250,000 in fines...