A national group of state lawmakers have approved a model law making it a crime to stage car crashes and recruit for phony auto accident rings.

The National Conference of Insurance Legislators unanimously passed a model bill at its summer meeting in Boston earlier this month.

The measure would among other things:

o Make it a crime to fake accidents on paper or to stage accidents using vehicles.

o Make it a crime to recruit members of accident rings, or hire recruiters.

o Limit outsider access to police accident reports, which accident gangs often use to target real accident victims for fake or inflated medical treatment.

o Suspend the driver's license of anyone driving a vehicle to stage a crash.

“State lawmakers are signaling they realize prosecutors can dismantle accident rings far more effectively with a targeted fraud law that helps them apply constant pressure against gang members in court,” said Howard Goldblatt, director of government affairs for the Coalition Against Insurance Fraud.

The NCOIL bill is based on a Coalition model and on fraud laws in Florida and bills in New York. The New York measures have been stymied by political dueling between Republicans, who control the state Senate, and Democrats, who control the Assembly.

Mr. Goldblatt said staged accident rings steal several billion dollars in bogus injury claims a year around the U.S. “The problem is especially acute in urban areas, where large volumes of car crashes and injury claims are plausible. This makes it easier to camouflage bogus crashes and fake medical treatment,” he said.

He explained that many accident rings have 100 or more members, and are skilled at mass-producing fake injury claims worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. “Phony injury claims can be highly profitable,” Mr. Goldblatt said. “They can be equally hard to prosecute in court, but targeted fraud laws give prosecutors leverage that can increase convictions.”

Special Reports /

NCOIL Passes Accident Fraud Model Law

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