Denver’s Dirty Dozen Derailed

The Colorado District Attorney’s office obtained a 39-count indictment charging a dozen individuals for their roles in a Denver metro-area fraud ring. According to NBC Colorado News the 12 individuals allegedly staged multiple car accidents, falsified damage estimates and filed multiple claims on the same vehicle over a two year period.

 “According to the indictment, the enterprise filed about $460,000 in false claims. The 12 people indicted are suspected of filing 35 fraudulent claims to 12 different insurance companies from March 2007 to November 2009.”

 Those charged in the indictment are: Rene Zakhem, Tariq Alzuwayed, Marwen Zakhem, Riad Zakhem, Hassan Khechen, Joelle Zakhem, Michelle Zakhem, Saad Hamad, Xexela Martinez, Wissam Khechen, Abdulrahman Fawzy and Amin Ahmed.

 In addition to the fraud allegations, authorities believe that the defendants also used the identities of local students to register some of the vehicles and to file the false claims.

 Schemes like this are nothing new to the insurance industry and some feel that insurance money is theirs for the taking. Fortunately, the Denver authorities extinguished this ring before more claims were filed.  Chalk one up for the good guys!