Forensic Accounting Helps To Convict In Insurance Fraud – 22 Feb 2013

A claims management company has been shut down and two fraudsters jailed after a ‘crash for cash’ fraud ring was exposed through the work of the Metropolitan Police and painstaking backroom work on the criminals’ financial dealings.  Last week company secretary of the firm and the ring’s mastermind, Andre Malagiac was sentenced to 12 months in prison after pleading guilty to conspiracy to defraud, while his accomplice received a four month prison sentence and had his car seized for his role as a stooge driver who deliberately caused crashes.

Officers from the Met Police Traffic Unit launched the investigation in November 2011 following intelligence that the company run by Malagiac was organising induced accidents across London.   Malagiac helped to orchestrate the scams in collusion with stooge drivers, who were sent out to deliberately cause crashes with unsuspecting motorists, typically on slip roads or at roundabouts.

After the arrest of the two men in June 2012, a potentially multi-million pound fraud was uncovered, which was masked behind the seemingly-legitimate front of the claims management company.   Guilty pleas demonstrated the quality of the evidence gathered by the Metropolitan Police and the investigative work carried on behind the scenes once records and accounts had been seized.

Since organised fraud costs the insurance industry almost £2.1bn a year and inflates premiums for honest policyholders, the work carried out in uncovering evidence against the criminals who perpetrate it is vital to the industry and the taxpayer.

Author: Roger Isaacs, 22nd February 2013

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