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TRENTON
- Attorney General Anne Milgram and Criminal
Justice Director Gregory A. Paw, announced
that a Pennsylvania man was sentenced today
to state prison for his role in an auto
theft and insurance fraud ring.
According
to Insurance Fraud Prosecutor Greta Gooden
Brown, Artur Lapinski, 27, of Bethlehem,
Pa., was sentenced to three years in state
prison by Superior Court Judge Frederick
P. DeVesa in Middlesex County. Lapinski
was sentenced pursuant to his guilty plea
to conspiracy to receive and fence stolen
property, a charge contained in an Oct.
25, 2006 Middlesex County grand jury indictment.
At
the April 13 guilty plea hearing before
Judge DeVesa, Lapinski admitted that between
Nov. 8 and Nov.10, 2004, he conspired with
other persons to possess and sell two stolen
2005 Hummer H2 motor vehicles for $6,000
each. It is alleged that the motor vehicles
belonged to James Hummer, an automobile
dealership in Flemington.
This
indictment was part of a wide-ranging investigation
into automobile thefts from dealerships
and automobile “give ups.” A
give up occurs when the owner of an automobile
voluntarily gives his car to another in
order to submit a phony auto theft insurance
claim. The car is typically chopped for
parts or retagged with a new vehicle identification
number and sold.
To
date, the Office of the Insurance Fraud
Prosecutor has identified roughly $803,000
worth of stolen automobiles as a result
of the wide-ranging investigation in which
Lapinski was indicted.
The
investigation was coordinated by State Investigators
Jeffrey Lorman, Jarek Pyrzanowski, Joseph
Luccarelli, Wendy Wylie and Kelly Howard,
Civil Investigator Gary Miller, Analysts
Paula Carter and Barbara Ziolkowski, and
Deputy Attorney General Jacqueline D. Smith.
Smith represented the Office of Insurance
Fraud Prosecutor at the sentencing.
The
Office of the Insurance Fraud Prosecutor
was established by the Automobile Insurance
Cost Reduction Act of 1998. The Office is
the centralized state agency that investigates
and prosecutes both civil and criminal insurance
fraud, as well as Medicaid fraud.
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