Insurance agent sentenced in fraud
That’s why the Brigham City insurance agent signed up a woman he once dated, a man who repaired his car and even a dog named “Missy” for employee group health insurance plans. All fraudulently, according to charges filed in a Brigham City court by the Utah Attorney General’s Office.
“This is kind of an odd one,” said J. Denis Kroll, assistant Utah Attorney General. “It’s something we haven’t run across before, and it certainly was creative.”
After pleading guilty to insurance fraud and forgery, Conlin was sentenced last week to serve 20 days in the Box Elder County Jail and pay a $21,700 fine for writing false insurance policies to get the commissions.
AFLAC investigators told the Utah Attorney General’s Office that Conlin submitted applications for people on employee group health insurance plans.
“He was trying to make more money by writing group policies,” Kroll said. “If he ever found a couple, they needed a third person. So he’d invent somebody.”
One included a couple who applied for an accident policy to cover them both. Instead, prosecutors allege that Conlin wrote two policies. A month later, he submitted an application for a “Missy Clonts” — who turns out to be the family dog.
“On 214 occasions the individual applicants did not actually work for the company specified and did not sign an application for insurance,” investigators wrote in a probable cause statement. Prosecutors claimed that Conlin made $21,053 in commissions.
Confronted about the discrepancies, Conlin told AFLAC investigators he needed the money from the commissions to help in a divorce and child-custody dispute.