Steve Poizner, California Insurance Commissioner and Republican gubernatorial candidate, has garnered various accolades for his strong anti-fraud stance. Unfortunately, one of his relatives may have pursued a much less noble path.
The Los Angeles Times recently reported that Paul Daniel Poizner, 45, is facing 60 counts of embezzlement and auto insurance fraud. Investigators with the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Insurance Fraud Bureau of Investigation arrested him at his Ventura County, Calif. home on Jan. 21, 2010, in connection with an extensive auto claim fraud scheme.
Los Angeles County, Calif. prosecutors contend that Poizner, while working as an insurance adjuster with California Casualty Management (CCM), submitted checks for auto claims that exceeded the amount of repairs and then pocketed the difference. The plot thickened when CCM audited auto damage claims submitted between May 2008 and Feb. 2009, according to the criminal complaint filed by L.A. County prosecutors. CCM then contacted the offices of the prosecutor and the insurance commissioner in March.
At press time, Paul Poizner was being held on $294,000 bail, just shy of the $300,000 he is accused of collecting from the scheme.
A spokesman for Steve Poizner’s office said the insurance commissioner immediately recused himself from the investigation. Commissioner Poizner recently received a fraud-fighting award from the Employers’ Fraud Task Force. Approximately 2,000 insurance fraud-related arrests have been made by the Department of Insurance’s enforcement division since he assumed office in 2007 — more arrests than in any other two-year period, under any previous insurance commissioner.