WHAT A HEEL: Identity Theft + Insurance Fraud = Imprisonment + Taxes + Fines
James Allen Wilson, who worked in the billing department of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center between 2003 and 2007, has been sentenced to four years, eight months in prison after pleading guilty one count each of identity theft, insurance fraud and grand theft for stealing patient information to defraud insurance companies of $354,000, reports the Los Angeles Times:
The hospital had sent letters in December to more than 1,000 patients, warning them that their personal information had been found during a search of the home of Wilson was charged with using the information of 12 of the victims, all of them Los Angeles Unified School District employees who had filed workers' compensation claims, to bill insurance companies more than $1.3 million for medical treatment that was never provided.
Prosecutors say Wilson’s scam generated $354K – and he also pleaded guilty to two counts of failure to file income taxes in 2005 and 2007.
In addition to jail time, Wilson was ordered to pay back every dollar in restitution to L.A. Unified, as well as $62K in back taxes and penalties to the CA Franchise Tax Board.
Identity theft has become a major, major problem! And living without protection is like living in a crime infested neighborhood and not having protection on your home. You would probably at least have a really good guard dog and a fence right? Well, not protecting your identity today is the equivalent of living in that neighborhood and refusing to even lock your door. It’s so sad that it’s come to this, but there are always tradeoffs in life. Because we want better medical coverage and a nicer car we pay more to protect and insure them.
Likewise, with something as amazing as the World Wide Web there come tradeoffs also. One tradeoff for us having access to almost everything is that others have access to almost everything about us, our information. And that includes our personal information like social security numbers, banking information and even your medical and criminal history.
Luckily there is a lot of information out to help us understand and protect ourselves from these heartless criminals. Here is an informational website put together to help you and your family. We hope you find it helpful. ID theft insurance
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