Life Insurance Fraud—Virginia

Amount: Unknown

A woman in Portsmouth pleaded guilty on Tuesday to fraud and conspiracy charges after faking her own death in connection to an elaborate bank fraud scheme. Court documents state that the fraudster and her husband conspired together to collect on two life insurance policies they had obtained. The woman travelled from Virginia to Washington State, where she changed her legal name. The couple then created a fake death certificate and published a death notice in the local newspaper. Despite these efforts, both claims were still denied. The couple then decided to go on a cross-country shopping spree where they purchased at least twenty new and nearly new luxury vehicles using counterfeit checks and forged documents. They then retitled the cars and used them as collateral for loans and for other vehicles, all the while the fraudster was using the fake name she had established for herself to purchase the vehicles. Both individuals pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bank fraud, possessing and uttering a counterfeit security of an organization, and conspiracy to commit mail fraud. Both face a maximum of thirty years in prison and will be sentenced in the first two months of 2018.