Fla. Initiates Fradulent Claim Fast-Tracking

Florida drivers who participate in a staged crash, regardless of whether they file a fraudulent insurance claim, now will not only face a minimum of two years in prison but will also lose their driving privileges if convicted.

Florida’s Chief Financial Officer Tom Gallagher recently delivered to Fred Dickinson, executive director of the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, investigative files listing 22 individuals whose licenses will be revoked under a fast-track process arranged by the two departments. The individuals named in the files have been convicted of participating in staged crashes that defrauded insurers of more than $200,000.

By law, anyone who uses a vehicle in Florida in the commission of a felony– whether as a driver or a passenger–can have their driver’s license revoked. A 2003 law made organizing or participating in a staged crash a second-degree felony punishable by a minimum mandatory two-year sentence. So far, more than 70 people have been charged under that law.

With this new fast-track process, the DHSMV will administratively suspend the driving privileges of anyone charged with a qualifying offense. The department’s fraud division expects to make more than 200 auto insurance fraud arrests this year.

In the last five years, the Department of Financial Services’ Division of Insurance Fraud has arrested more than 900 people in connection with at least $25 million in auto insurance fraud. Estimates show auto insurance fraud costs the average Florida family as much as $250 a year in higher premiums and higher costs for goods and services.

Florida drivers are required to carry a minimum of $10,000 in Personal Injury Protection (PIP) insurance coverage and $10,000 in property damage coverage. By staging crashes, the planners and participants–usually in connection with unscrupulous medical clinic owners–fraudulently bill auto insurance companies for medical treatments that never happened or were unnecessary.