PROFESSIONAL LICENSE HIJACKING – INSURANCE BROKER USES FALSE IDENTITY AND LICENSE

Identity thieves not only hit consumers, but also often assume the identity of professionals in order to hijack their professional credentials and licenses. An example recently occurred in New York when Attorney General Eliot Spitzer announced the indictment of a Bronx man who sold insurance policies using another man’s name. The 34-count indictment charges the defendant with identity theft, scheme to defraud, grand larceny, forgery, offering a false instrument for filing, falsifying business records, and unlawful duplication of computer related material.

The scheme began in 1993 when the thief first took the state insurance licensing exams on separate dates under his own name and under another man’s name. The defendant then placed thousands of policy applications with over 20 insurance companies in the name of the second individual. For more than ten years, the defendant took continuing education courses while pretending to be the other person, periodically renewed the broker’s license that he held in that second person’s name, appeared at Insurance Department disciplinary proceedings as that individual, and appropriated at least $300,000 in commissions that the insurance companies sent to the defendants business address in the name of the other individual.

This case is described in some detail in the 2006 New York State 5 Year Auto Insurance Fraud Report. The report may be found at: http://www.oag.state.ny.us/press/2006/jul/Final%205%20year%20report.pdf

Posted by Tim Logan