ZIFL Volume 28 Issue 15
Post 4847
Read the full article at https://lnkd.in/gAxk_9sA, see the full video at https://lnkd.in/gJjA4797 and at https://lnkd.in/g6dA8eff, and https://zalma.com/blog.
Read the full issue of ZIFL and the full article here https://lnkd.in/gaFvcuTg
The Source for the Insurance Fraud Professional
Subscribe to ZIFL
Zalma’s Insurance Fraud Letter (ZIFL) continues its 28th year of publication dedicated to those involved in reducing the effect of insurance fraud. ZIFL is published 24 times a year by ClaimSchool and is written by Barry Zalma. It is provided FREE to anyone who visits the site at http://zalma.com/zalmas-insurance-fraud-letter-2/ This issue contains the following articles about insurance:
Guilty of Workers’ Compensation Fraud
Inflating On-The-Job Injury is Fraud
A jury found Waliullah Nazari guilty of two counts of making false and fraudulent statements for the purpose of obtaining workers’ Compensation benefits and seven counts of attempted perjury under oath.
In The People v. Waliullah Nazari, D081940, California Court of Appeals, Fourth District, First Division (July 18, 2024) the Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction because surveillance proved Nazari had lied to his physician and insurer.
Read the full issue of ZIFL and the full article here http://zalma.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/ZIFL-08-01-2024.pdf
What is Insurance Fraud?
Insurance fraud is the most popular and perpetrated crime in the world next to, perhaps, tax fraud. The possibility of a tax-free profit, coupled with the commonly held belief (supported by actual arrest and conviction records) that criminal prosecution will not occur, is sometimes too difficult for normally honest people to resist.
Each year, the effect of insurance fraud runs to billions of dollars. It is estimated that insurance fraud takes between 33 and 38 percent of the premiums collected and annually drains as much as $300 billion or more from the assets of insurers in the United States.
Insurance fraud occurs when a person or entity makes false insurance claims in order to obtain compensation or benefits to which they are not entitled. Insurance fraud is committed in many forms, but regardless of the type, it is considered a serious crime in all jurisdictions.
Read the full issue of ZIFL and the full article here http://zalma.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/ZIFL-08-01-2024.pdf
More McClenny Moseley & Associates Issues
This is ZIFL’s thirty third installment of the saga of McClenny, Moseley & Associates and its problems with the federal courts in the State of Louisiana and what appears to be an effort to profit from what some Magistrate and District judges indicate may be criminal conduct to profit from insurance claims relating to hurricane damage to the public of the state of Louisiana.
July 9, 2024
The law firm, Morris Bart filed a Complaint for Injunctive Relief and for Declaratory Judgment against MMA in the Eastern District of Louisiana years ago.
Health Insurance Fraud Convictions
Help to the DOJ From Whistleblower/Qui Tam Suits
$2.45 Million Health Care Fraud Settlement
Vista Clinical Diagnostics, LLC, for allegedly submitting or causing the submission of false claims to Medicare and Medicaid programs in North Carolina, Virginia, and Florida. These settlement funds will be returned to the Medicare and Medicaid programs.
From Jan. 1, 2017, through Dec. 31, 2021, Vista Clinical allegedly submitted or caused to be submitted reimbursement claims to Medicare and Medicaid by adding diagnosis codes into patients’ reimbursement submissions that had not been provided by those patients’ physicians.
Read the full issue of ZIFL and the full article including dozens of settlements and convictions here http://zalma.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/ZIFL-08-01-2024.pdf
The Reasons for an Examination Under Oath
The EUO Is Not an Adversary Proceeding like a Deposition in a Lawsuit.
The Examination Under Oath (EUO) is an investigative tool made available to the insurer. It allows the insurer to delve deeply and under oath into all aspects of the policy and the loss. The testimony to be elicited is not constrained by rules of discovery or the Codes of Civil Procedure.
The only restraint on the EUO is reasonableness although some courts do not even include a reasonableness standard. Regardless, the person taking the EUO must always act reasonably while understanding that unlimited questions are allowed. Only irrelevant and unreasonable questions dealing with facts completely outside the policy, its acquisition or the loss are not favored.
Read the full issue of ZIFL and the full article here http://zalma.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/ZIFL-08-01-2024.pdf
Barry Zalma
Barry Zalma, Esq., CFE, now limits his practice to service as an insurance consultant specializing in insurance coverage, insurance claims handling, insurance bad faith and insurance fraud almost equally for insurers and policyholders. He also serves as an arbitrator or mediator for insurance related disputes. He practiced law in for more than 44 years as an insurance coverage and claims handling lawyer and more than 54 years in the insurance business. He is available at http://www.zalma.com and [email protected].
Read the full issue of ZIFL and the full article here http://zalma.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/ZIFL-08-01-2024.pdf
Read the full issue at https://lnkd.in/gaFvcuTg
The Largest Residential Burglary of All Time
Post 5407
Fraud & the Fear of Bad Faith Suits
Posted on July 22, 2026 by Barry Zalma
See the full video at https://lnkd.in/gWQQEySW and at https://lnkd.in/gyhdK6wv
This is a Fictionalized True Crime Story of Insurance Fraud explaining why Insurance Fraud is a “Heads I Win, Tails You Lose” situation for Insurers. The story is one of a collection designed to help to Understand How Insurance Fraud in America is Costing Everyone who Buys Insurance Thousands of Dollars Every year and Why Insurance Fraud is Safer and More Profitable for the Perpetrators than any Other Crime.
This is a Fictionalized True Crime Story of Insurance Fraud explaining why Insurance Fraud is a “Heads I Win, Tails You Lose” situation for Insurers. The story is one of a collection designed to help to Understand How Insurance Fraud in America is Costing Everyone who Buys Insurance Thousands of Dollars Every year and Why Insurance Fraud is Safer and More Profitable for the Perpetrators than any Other Crime.
After ...
Chutzpah is not Enough
Post 5397
Posted on July 20, 2026 by Barry Zalma
See the video and at https://lnkd.in/gNUs2XzT and at https://lnkd.in/g2MawyzX
Magistrate Issues a Search Warrant if there is a Fair Probability that Contraband or Evidence of a Crime will be Found in a Particular Place.
In United States Of America v. Frank Suess, et al., CRIMINAL No. 3:24-308, United States District Court, M.D. Pennsylvania (July 16, 2026) a federal grand jury indicted Frank Suess, Melissa Driscoll, and others in a 55-count health care fraud and anti-kickback prosecution arising from an alleged scheme involving medically unnecessary prescription “foot baths.”
As part of the investigation, the FBI obtained an August 19, 2022 warrant to search Driscoll’s Sterling Pharmacy Yahoo email account for emails from January 1, 2018 through December 31, 2020. Driscoll moved to suppress the resulting evidence, arguing that the warrant lacked probable cause, was overbroad, and rested on material misstatements and omissions.
LAW:
The ...
Fraud Shouldn’t Pay
Post 5396
See the video and at https://rumble.com/v7ctgmq-the-great-jewel-theft.html at https://youtu.be/aRbQ2sJfGwA
This is a Fictionalized True Crime Story of Insurance Fraud explaining why Insurance Fraud is a “Heads I Win, Tails You Lose” situation for Insurers. The story is one of a collection designed to help to Understand How Insurance Fraud in America is Costing Everyone who Buys Insurance Thousands of Dollars Every year and Why Insurance Fraud is Safer and More Profitable for the ¬¬¬Perpetrators than any Other Crime.
The Insured purchased, for the first time in his life, a policy of Personal Articles Floater Insurance (PAF) scheduling $125,000 worth of ladies jewelry. He advised the insurer that the jewelry was always kept in a class E safe at his residence. He also told the insurer that he was employed full time as the owner of a gasoline service station and that he had never been canceled or suffered a previous loss.
One month after the policy was ...
Day Care Owner Loses Subsidies Because She Criticized State
Post 5421
Posted on August 11, 2026 by Barry Zalma
First Amendment Right Will be Allowed to Go to Trial
In Betsey J. Grant v. Maine State Department Of Heath And Human Services, No. 1:25-cv-00490-JAW, United States District Court, D. Maine (August 6, 2026), Betsey J. Grant, a licensed childcare provider and operator of Tiny Tikes Daycare in Trenton, Maine, sued Maine DHHS and several employees after she publicly criticized DHHS before Maine’s Government Oversight Committee and alleged that officials retaliated against her.
She claimed DHHS imposed and extended a conditional license, published stigmatizing information, interfered with subsidies and program funding, removed her from a food program, rescinded an expansion grant, and used biased or falsified evidence in licensing proceedings. Following the March 10, 2023, GOC testimony, Ms. Grant alleges that foster children's subsidies (approximately $30,000) were withheld; she was removed from the ...
Rescission for Material Misrepresentation
Post 5418
Posted on August 5, 2026 by Barry Zalma
An Insurer May Rescind An Insurance Policy Where The Applicant Made A Material Misrepresentation In The Application.
In Union Mutual Fire Insurance Company v. 844 Knickerbocker, LLC, et al. No. 2024-10359, Index No. 602824/22, 2026 NY Slip Op 04789, Supreme Court of New York, Second Department (July 29, 2026) Union Mutual Fire Insurance Company issued commercial insurance policies to 844 Knickerbocker, LLC, and Sanjaya Mallick based on applications stating that the insured property contained two apartment units. After an underlying personal injury action was filed, Union Mutual determined that the property actually contained three apartment units and rescinded the policies on the ground that the defendants had made a material misrepresentation in the applications.
LAW:
A misrepresentation is material if the insurer would not have issued the same policy, or would have issued it only on different terms, had the true ...
Rescission for Material Misrepresentation
Post 5418
Posted on August 5, 2026 by Barry Zalma
An Insurer May Rescind An Insurance Policy Where The Applicant Made A Material Misrepresentation In The Application.
In Union Mutual Fire Insurance Company v. 844 Knickerbocker, LLC, et al. No. 2024-10359, Index No. 602824/22, 2026 NY Slip Op 04789, Supreme Court of New York, Second Department (July 29, 2026) Union Mutual Fire Insurance Company issued commercial insurance policies to 844 Knickerbocker, LLC, and Sanjaya Mallick based on applications stating that the insured property contained two apartment units.
LAW:
A misrepresentation is material if the insurer would not have issued the same policy, or would have issued it only on different terms, had the true facts been disclosed. To establish materiality as a matter of law, the insurer must submit documentation of its underwriting practices, such as manuals, guidelines, bulletins, or rules addressing similar risks.
DISCUSSION/ANALYSIS:
As a result, the...
