NC Man Convicted in $2.7M Workers’ Comp Scam

Back in June we brought you the story of an “insurance agent” who was arrested for workers’ compensation fraud. We say “insurance agent,” because he was not actually a real agent, but simply posing as one.

According to a Florida Department of Financial Services (DFS) news release and Florida CFO Jeff Atwater, Carl Delmas Fuller, 53, was convicted in the case after he pled guilty to one count of mail fraud.

Fuller was sentenced to four years in prison and was ordered to pay restitution of over $3.1 million for scamming a Highlands County employment services company with a fake workers’ comp policy.

“Fraud scams like this destroy the stability of our economy and inhibit the growth of Florida businesses,” said CFO Atwater. “We will not sit by and let scam artists and thieves rob Florida businesses and taxpayers out of their hard-earned dollars. This conviction is another win in our ongoing battle against insurance fraud in Florida.”

An investigation by DFS’ Division of Insurance Fraud found that National Employment Services (NES) believed that they had purchased the required workers’ comp coverage through a North Carolina insurance agent named David Walters who worked for Southeast Services Incorporated. NES provided proof that they had paid Southeast Services over $2.7 million in workers’ comp premiums for which Walters issued multiple certificates of insurance.

Further investigation showed that the company that was named as the carrier of the policy had no agent by the name of David Walters, no affiliation with an entity by the name of Southeast Services, Inc., and had never even received any type of premium payments from or on behalf of NES.

Bank records revealed that the business address used by Southeast Services was a private mail box owned exclusively by Carl Delmas Fuller.

Employees of the mail box business and a North Carolina bank positively identified Fuller as the sole owner of the bank account and the mail box for Southeast Services. Analysis of this checking account determined that no premium payments were ever made or forwarded to any insurance company, but that hundreds of thousands of dollars were just paid directly to Fuller.