Insurance Fraud Casebook: Paying a Premium for Crime

Transparent Greed

JOSEPH LICANDRO

Behind every company contaminated with fraud usually lies a group of perpetrators willing to risk jail and the company's long-term sustainability for personal greed. Glass Star, the most popular glass replacement store in the northwest region of the state, with more than 20 branches, was no different. What made Glass Star's fraud unique was not that contamination occurred but that two independent actors committing the same type of fraud prospered simultaneously while upper-level management looked the other way the entire time.

Sure, greed was a strong motivation for Casey Thomas and Chet Sterling, but that was not their only motivation. For Casey, who came from one of the two families that founded Glass Star's nearly three-quarters of a century ago, fraud was about exerting control and implementing his vision — remaking the company from a local brand to a state powerhouse. For lone-wolf Chet Sterling, who married into the company almost 15 years before and was handed the job as manager of the Broad Street store, fraud was more personal. Chet was a taciturn, socially awkward individual with few friends, and he never bothered to make any at Broad Street. Sure, Chet enjoyed the bonuses he earned from his inflated insurance bills. But to him, fraud was also about demonstrating to all of his doubters and detractors that he could run the most profitable ...