The National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB) receives 100,000+ questionable insurance claims annually, more than 70% of which are auto-related. These fraudulent insurance claims are worth $30 billion per year, and the monies lost due to these claims are passed on to the policyholders costing them about $700 a year paid through higher insurance premiums. This webinar looks into investigating staged accidents and how the NICB assists in these cases.

This session’s speaker is Special Agent Amy Phelps of the NICB. She is a blended special agent assigned to investigate medical claims and commercial and vehicle thefts. Prior to this role, she served with the Louisville Metro Police Department’s Homicide Squad, Training Division, and Special Victims Unit.

Specifics of the presentation include:

• An overview of the NICBS’s work focusing on intelligence, analytics, operations, strategy, policy, education, crime prevention, and advocacy.
• How staged accidents leading to questionable insurance claims cost the US billions of dollars per year.
• An example of a staged accident scenario and fraud indicators observed in the case.
• A video demonstrating how staged collisions are done to commit insurance fraud.
• The three types of staged accidents: Orchestrated, Paper, and Caused, the common factor between them, and the criminal nature of these cases.
• Organized Staged Accident Groups: Who they are, their members and associations, the communities, vehicles, and demographics they target.
• The importance of identifying individuals and providers for investigations, including obtaining information on insured parties, claimants, witnesses, providers, and other relevant individuals.
• The hierarchical structure of OSAGs, the role of the actors, and where they fall in on the money chain.
• Obtaining personal identifiers during investigations and how participants tend to provide more truthful information in insurance claims than they do to the police on the scene.
• Pieces of information that can be cross-referenced using the NICB’s ISO database.
• Identifying prior claims: Where and what to look, strategies to effectively find prior claims.
• Elements to examine and obtain when reviewing claims to establish fraud and associations between individuals and providers.
• Components to check for when researching vehicles as prior claims, owner/title histories, registration information, and leased/rental vehicle data to identify fraud patterns.
• Guidelines for effective documentation of investigations.
  • The importance of maintaining thorough and organized records.
  • Fraud indicators to watch for include accidents right after renting a vehicle, multiple passengers in vehicles, inconsistent stories from involved parties, and unreported injuries.
  • Sources of evidence, information, and reports within the accident location and immediately surrounding and following it.
  • Factors to take into account before and during interviews
• Considerations during the evaluation of facts and evidence that determine the direction and outcome of the investigation.
• What NICB’s analysts can assist within each step of the investigative process.

Points raised by webinar attendees are:

• Access to the ISO Claim Search database for private forensic consultants and Canadian entities.
• Whether specific types or brands of vehicles are targeted.
• Whether criminals avoid vehicles with dash cameras.
• Claimants submitting spoofed photos or videos.
• If OSAGs can be prosecuted under RICO.
• Prosecution of attorneys involved in insurance fraud cases.

Other Webinars with this Organization:

• Nov 1: Are You Missing Critical Data That Could Help Your Investigations?
• Jan 31: Investigating Vehicle Theft and Car Jacking 
• May 2: Investigating Catastrophe Fraud Cases 
• June 27: What is a Real Time Crime Center and How Do You Start One?
• Aug 29: Getting Back to Center: Realign with Your Mission by Leveraging a Managed Services Provider
• Sept 7: Investigating Staged Accidents (this webinar)

Click here to view and register for other upcoming Nlets webinars on the JCH Platform.

Resources and Handouts

• Handout: Guide

Audience Comments

• “I felt that all of the resource locations were some of the biggest takeaways. I also enjoyed the overall sincerity, interest and devotion to the topic.” — Russell
• “That I can reach out to the NICB for Arson investigations too.” — John
• “Great information coming from an actual investigator, within the industry.” — Jovan
• “Just all the various types of fraud perpetrated by bad actors in staging fraudulent claims. Also, I went to the website she referenced (NICB) for fraud indicators and indeed there is a lot of information in addition to everything the presenter displayed.” — ROBERT
• “Amy, excellent presentation. Wish your slide presentation was better coordinated with your verbal presentation.” — Barbara
• “Excellent insight into a growing criminal concern. Thank you.” — Bart

Nlets is a self-funded nonprofit, established in 1967 with the objective of connecting law enforcement, justice, and public safety agencies for the purpose of exchanging critical criminal justice information. They strive to ensure that the right information gets to the right person as quickly as possible. Nlets connects more than 1,000,000 users, 45,000 agencies, and 800,000 devices, with more than three billion transactions traversing their secure network last year.