Gettel informed Trooper Rhinehart that the vehicle had been stolen and that she did not have any information concerning what happened after it was parked.

Gettel later supplied Trooper Rhinehart with all of her insurance information and then filed a claim with Safe Auto, her insurance provider.

In a subsequent interview, held several months later, Gettel informed Trooper Rhinehart that she had not been completely honest in the first interview. She informed Trooper Rhinehart that she knew who had taken the vehicle and the person's name was Chad. When Trooper Rhinehart called Stephanie Foster, Gettel's friend, to get the contact information on Chad, Ms. Foster informed the trooper that the only people at her residence that night were herself, Gettel, and her now ex-boyfriend.

Trooper Rhinehart eventually picked Gettel up on a warrant at Harrisburg Area Community College. When Gettel was picked up on the warrant, she informed Trooper Rhinehart that the information regarding Chad was not true.

Gettel was charged with insurance fraud and making false reports to law enforcement authorities in connection with this incident.

After a jury trial, she was found guilty of all charges. Gettel was sentenced to an aggregate term of one to 12 months' imprisonment, to be followed by nine months' probation.

The trial court denied her post-sentence motion for reconsideration of her sentence, and she appealed, raising the following issues:

I. Was the evidence concerning the charge of insurance fraud insufficient as a matter of law where prosecutors presented no evidence of Gettel's intent to defraud the insurer or materiality of any false statements?

II. Did the trial court abuse its discretion when sentencing Gettel to a term of imprisonment after interpreting her silence at sentencing as lack of remorse?

Pennsylvania Law

Pennsylvania law provides that a person is guilty of insurance fraud when the person:

knowingly and with the intent to defraud any insurer or self-insured, presents or causes to be presented to any insurer or self-insured any statement forming a part of, or in support of, a claim that contains any false, incomplete or misleading information concerning any fact or thing material to the claim.

18 Pa.C.S.A. § 4117(a)(2).

A person acts:

knowingly

when the person:

is aware that it is practically certain that [the person's] conduct will cause such a result.

18 Pa.C.S.A. § 302(b)(2)(ii).

A person acts:

intentionally

when

it is [the person's] conscious object to engage in conduct of that nature or to cause such a result.

18 Pa.C.S.A. § 302(b)(1)(i).

The law defines:

statement

as:

Any oral or written presentation or other evidence of loss, injury or expense, including, but not limited to, any notice, statement, proof of loss, bill of lading, receipt for payment, invoice, account, estimate of property damages, bill for services, . . . or computer-generated documents.

18 Pa.C.S.A. § 4117(l).

The Appellate Court's Decision

The appellate court affirmed.

In its decision, the appellate court first rejected Gettel's claim that there was insufficient evidence to sustain her conviction for insurance fraud because prosecutors had failed to prove that she had intended to defraud Safe Auto or had made any materially false statements.

The appellate court observed that the evidence introduced at trial established that Gettel had knowingly made three false statements to Trooper Rhinehart during the course of her investigation into her vehicle. The appellate court added that Gettel had submitted an insurance claim with Safe Auto in the amount of $9,599 on the basis that her vehicle had been “stolen” and “subsequently burned as a result of an accident[,]” knowing that this was untrue.

The appellate court pointed out that Gettel also had submitted a notarized theft affidavit to Safe Auto, although the insurer never paid the claim.

According to the appellate court, the “requisite intent to commit insurance fraud” could be “inferred from the surrounding circumstances” – namely, Gettel's conduct during the course of Trooper Rhinehart's investigation and her submission of an insurance claim based on this “fabricated narrative.”

The appellate court added that although 18 Pa.C.S.A. § 4117 did not provide guidance on the meaning of the word “material,” it did “not require an insuree to cause actual injury to the insurer” – the “mere submission of any false statement done knowingly and with intent to defraud” was “sufficient to violate the statute.”

The appellate court next rejected Gettel's attack on her sentence, reasoning that the trial court had not relied solely on Gettel's lack of remorse or silence in fashioning her sentence but that it also was in possession of a presentence investigation report “and clearly considered it.”

The appellate court concluded that although the trial court “briefly expressed its disappointment” that Gettel had failed to apologize at sentencing, the record was unclear as to how much of a factor her silence was in the trial court's finding of lack of remorse. Accordingly, it concluded that her challenge to the discretionary aspects of her sentence had to fail.

The case is Commonwealth v. Gettel, No. 533 MDA 2017 (Pa. Super.Ct. Nov. 7, 2017).