3 Things To Know If You Are Facing Insurance Fraud Charges

Law Articles

Being charged with the crime of insurance fraud is a serious issue, and you will need to hire a criminal lawyer if you are in this situation. Insurance fraud costs people and insurance companies money, and it can result in serving time in prison and other punishments if you are found guilty. If you are currently facing charges for this crime, here are several things you should know.

What is insurance fraud?

Insurance is something people have to protect them from unexpected damages and problems, and there are multiple types of insurance policies you can get. The purpose is to reimburse you for damages that occurred, but there are many ways people use insurance in illegal ways. Using it illegally is fraud, and here are some examples of common types of insurance fraud:

  • Car insurance fraud – If you had damaged your car a while back and then got in an accident and claimed that all the damage occurred from the accident, this would be fraud.
  • Life insurance – Killing a person to receive their life insurance payout is a common type of fraud you may hear about a lot on crime shows, and this is something that happens a lot.
  • Home insurance – Burning down your own house and claiming it was an accident is also insurance fraud.

Insurance fraud could be any situation in which a person lies about something that happened in order to get money from his or her insurance company. In some cases, people are able to defraud hundreds of dollars from an insurance company, but there are other times when they are able to get hundreds of thousands of dollars.

How do courts prove insurance fraud?

When facing insurance fraud charges, you will not be found guilty in the case unless the other attorney is able to prove that you lied with the intention of collecting insurance money you really were not entitled to, or that you did not deserve to get. This is the main job of the prosecuting attorney, and your attorney's main job is to prove that you did not lie or do anything wrong in this case.

For example, you could be found guilty of this if there is evidence that shows you lit your own house on fire. It would be hard for a court to find you guilty of this, though, if they did not have any evidence that you started the fire. If you had an alibi when the fire started, the court may not be able to prove you did it.

What can happen if you are found guilty?

There are a lot of things that can happen to people found guilty of insurance fraud, but there are two main classifications of these crimes. The first type is called soft fraud, which is less serious, and the second type is called hard fraud, and this type is much more serious. Soft fraud is not really a lie to get insurance money, but it is more of an exaggeration to get more insurance money than you are entitled to. Crimes of soft fraud are typically classified as misdemeanors.

A crime classified as hard fraud is much more serious and is often charged as a felony. Hard fraud is much more than an exaggeration. It is when a person is found lying about an entire incident for the primary purpose of collecting insurance money. If all the evidence is against you in your case, your lawyer might work hard to try to get the charge dropped from hard fraud to soft fraud.

If you are facing any type of criminal charge and are not sure how to handle your case, you should begin by looking for a good criminal law firm to hire for help. 

Share

23 May 2017

How to Gain Guardianship Over a Child

The laws governing child custody and guardianship can be confusing. As a family attorney, I have helped many clients gain legal guardianship over a foster child or a relative's child. Getting legal guardianship of a child you are caring for is important because you need to be able to make decisions about that child's education, health care and other matters. This blog will help you navigate the world of legal guardianship and show you how to take steps to get guardianship over a child whether the child's parents are cooperative or not. Legal guardianship does matter even if a child is not going to be adopted. I hope to help people find the way to get this done.