She was charged with an astonishing six felonies of which two are Financial Elder Abuse and Grand Theft. Wyskiver allegedly “sold ‘pre-need’ burial plans to senior citizens, including residents of area nursing homes, then pocketed the premiums and left her elderly clients without funeral coverage.” She then proceeded to convince each client that the insurance policies were backed by “Forethought Life Insurance Company or Homesteader Life Insurance Company.”
I have a difficult time understanding how people, even the elderly can allow something like this to happen. I suppose they trusted her due to her ability to be very convincing for the six-year period between 1998 and 2004 that she was running this scam.
In related California fraud insurance news the California Assembly Insurance Committee passed a bill (AB 1401) that will “provide the CDI with additional investigators to fight insurance fraud and also require the CDI to post investigative program performance outcomes on its Web site” according to a CDI press release.
Apparently “since 1973 insurers have been required by law to pay an annual fee which helps California combat insurance fraud. AB 1401 would increase this assessment to $5,100 per insurer.” Shouldn’t the CDI be charging more per insurer? Its not like insurers are generally suffering for money and most insurers are big proponents of slowing down insurance fraud. I think $10,000 would be a sufficient amount to improve California’s ability to weed out more fraud and scams.
