Charles Lonardo, of the Lawrence, Mass. area, participated in a massive game of make-believe for quite some time. This would be innocent enough, if he was a young boy with an active imagination, but he is in fact a 48-year-old personal injury lawyer who is not all that innocent.
His scheme was, at least at first, relatively simple. Lonardo paid runners to stage auto accidents. They would bring him the alleged victims, who would then file claims with insurance companies for the pain and suffering endured. The plan began to unravel, however, when a high-profile staged crash ended in the death of a 65-year-old woman.
The woman, Altagracia Arias, was killed in September 2003 in a car crash that police say she helped to plan in order to scam an insurance company. After the crash, following the trail of evidence back to Lonardo was made even easier for investigators when he just couldn't keep his mouth shut.
After the fatal accident, Lonardo arranged for his office to call a runner, who was instructed to take previous crash victims "somewhere else" and "not to bring any new clients." Lonardo then offered to give up his license to practice law if the police would cease their investigations into his office. When asked by police why he would do such a thing, he responded with the supposedly hypothetical question, "What if I told you I paid runners?"
It was this evidence, along with testimony from one of the hired runners -- as well as some serious investigative work by the Police Chief John Romero and the Lawrence Police Department -- that cemented the defendant's conviction. Superior Court Judge Howard Whitehead upheld the April 2006 conviction, leaving Lonardo with charges of conspiracy to commit insurance fraud.
After moving from his office to a converted Victorian home to a jail cell, maybe Lonardo will start to understand that the game of pretend is best left for daycare playrooms.
Want to continue reading?
Become a Free PropertyCasualty360 Digital Reader
Your access to unlimited PropertyCasualty360 content isn’t changing.
Once you are an ALM digital member, you’ll receive:
- Breaking insurance news and analysis, on-site and via our newsletters and custom alerts
- Weekly Insurance Speak podcast featuring exclusive interviews with industry leaders
- Educational webcasts, white papers, and ebooks from industry thought leaders
- Critical converage of the employee benefits and financial advisory markets on our other ALM sites, BenefitsPRO and ThinkAdvisor
Already have an account? Sign In Now
© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.
