FGS Insurance Brokers Petitions for Liquidation

Sidney M. Field, former owner of the defunct FGS Insurance Agency, has filed a Chapter 7 bankruptcy liquidation petition for his FGS Insurance Brokers Inc.

Field, who is a co-defendant in a racketeering suit filed by the state Department of Insurance against FGS and a number of its officials, said FGS Insurance Brokers is a separate company that has been inactive since 1987, when its assets were acquired by Coastal Insurance Co., which later went bankrupt.

FGS Insurance Brokers is, however, named as one of the defendants in the state’s suit.

In a Chapter 7 filing in federal bankruptcy court in Santa Ana, Field lists $5,170 in assets and a potential liability of $300 million for FGS Insurance Brokers Inc., including $200 million in fines and penalties if the state wins its suit.

FGS Insurance Agency was seized by the Insurance Department in April after more than a year of legal wrangling over charges that it systematically cheated clients who came to the company seeking high-risk auto insurance cover-age.

The agency was placed in conservatorship and was liquidated in June.