4 Arrested in Insurance Car Crash Scheme

The administrator of a Sherman Oaks law office and three other people were arrested Friday in a scheme in which insurance companies were bilked out of $21,000 for medical claims stemming from faked car crashes, the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office reported.

Richard Smith, 46, of Granada Hills, the law office administrator, was named in a complaint charging 10 people with conspiracy, insurance fraud, grand theft and money laundering, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Eleanor Bigolski of the auto insurance fraud division.

Also arrested were Ronnie Johnson, 43; Tamara Campbell, 28, and Barbara Nunley, 56, all of Los Angeles. The names of six other people implicated in the activity--none of them have been arrested--were withheld. Bigolski said none of the 10 suspects are attorneys. Johnson was described by the prosecutor as the man who procured people for the scam and Campbell and Nunley were false claimants.

Authorities began investigating the alleged ring three years ago. Undercover officers who infiltrated the organization were used to file fake medical claims for accidents they were not involved in, Bigolski said.

The officers were directed to a now-closed storefront medical clinic in Los Angeles, where they received medical bills for nonexistent treatment, Bigolski said.

“The insurance companies were billed for X-rays that weren’t taken,” Bigolski said. “They billed them for treatment of soft-tissue injuries and there are records for this, but the officers never received the treatment.”

Claims were filed after the officers and their passengers in the phony crash were interviewed by Smith. Smith managed the law office of Gerald Wolfson, until his retirement two years ago, and then of Henry Bockman, who shared office space with Wolfson.

Neither Wolfson nor Bockman were named in the complaint. Bigolski said an investigation of the alleged fraud may continue after evidence seized during the arrests is analyzed.

Wolfson could not be reached for comment. Bockman said police searched his home Friday morning and seized old case files. He said that if any of his cases involved false injury claims, he was not aware of it.

“If there was anything to indicate that I did know, I’d be behind bars right now,” Bockman said.