14 Charged In Miami-Dade Auto Insurance Scam

MIAMI, FL — The Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office has filed charges against 14 people in connection with an auto insurance scam. Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle said the scheme involved insurance claims for phony auto repairs totaling some $530,000 in less than half a year. The defendants are facing charges of racketeering and related offenses.

In announcing the charges at on Tuesday, Fernandez Rundle said the scam centered around auto repairs. Two of the defendants were employed by Geico as insurance claim adjusters and used their positions to process phony claims.

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"They worked for the company. They did have a license, each of them," Fernandez Rundle said. "With that license was Geico's checkbook. And with that checkbook, was how they issued all that fraudulent money out to be paid."

All of the charges stemmed from incidents that occurred between July 2016 through February 2017. In some cases, the claims involved repairs to the same vehicles. Investigators also traced some of the repairs back to phony businesses, according to Fernandez Rundle.

The Miami-Dade state attorney was joined by Assistant Director Ernie Stoll with the Office of the Chief Financial Officer in the Florida Department of Financial Services and Major Rafael Delgado of the Florida Bureau of Insurance Fraud at Tuesday's press conference.

Katherine Fernandez Rundle photo by Paul Scicchitano