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TRENTON
- Attorney General Paula T. Dow and Criminal
Justice Director Stephen J. Taylor announced
that a former North Jersey insurance agency
employee was sentenced to state prison today
for diverting life insurance proceeds to
himself.
According
to Acting Insurance Fraud Prosecutor Riza
Dagli, Luigi Sacco, 50, of Fair Lawn, was
sentenced to three years in state prison
by Superior Court Judge Stuart Peim in Union
County and was ordered to pay $13,325 in
restitution. Sacco also agreed to pay a
$3,500 civil penalty. Sacco was sentenced
based on his guilty plea to second-degree
insurance fraud. The charge was contained
in a Union County indictment returned on
Feb. 24.
In
pleading guilty on June 21, Sacco, who worked
as an agent for Monumental Life Insurance
Company, located in Union, admitted that
between Aug. 27, 2004 and Dec. 16, 2005,
he submitted false disbursement request
forms purportedly representing the requests
of certain life insurance policy holders
to claim insurance proceeds from Monumental
Life Insurance Company, knowing the requests
were false. He then cashed the Monumental
checks himself or had them made payable
to the Hands and Ears Crisis Center (Helping
Hands), which cashed them and, in turn,
transmitted the proceeds to Sacco. The investigation
by the Office of the Insurance Fraud Prosecutor
revealed that more than $60,000 was stolen
from Monumental through this scheme.
On
Dec. 9, 2009, a co-conspirator, Vincent
Scaturro, 57, of Lodi, pleaded guilty before
Superior Court Judge Joseph P. Donohue in
Union County to an accusation charging him
with third-degree insurance fraud and was
subsequently sentenced to two years of probation
and ordered to pay restitution. By pleading
guilty, Scaturro admitted that he submitted
false disbursement request forms purportedly
representing the requests of certain life
insurance policyholders to claim insurance
proceeds from Monumental Life Insurance
Company, knowing these requests were false.
He admitted that he retained the insurance
policy proceeds for himself.
Detective
Sherri Stevens and Deputy Attorney General
Dennis Kwasnik were assigned to the investigation.
Kwasnik represented the Office of the Insurance
Fraud Prosecutor at the sentencing. Acting
Insurance Fraud Prosecutor Dagli thanked
Monumental Life Insurance Company for referring
this matter to the Office of the Insurance
Fraud Prosecutor and for assisting in the
investigation.
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