Monday, July 20, 2009

NYS Insurance Frauds Bureau Statistics First Half 2007-2009

The New York State Insurance Frauds Bureau has released its compiled statistics for the first halves of 2007 through 2009.  The report, sans analysis, is here.

Total reports are up, arrests are trending down, and convictions are again up.

2007
2008
2009
Reports
11,549
11,260
12,961
Arrests
388
344
323
Convictions
245
160
281

Percentage arrests and convictions per number of reports and arrests:

2007
2008
2009
Arrests/Reports
3.36%
3.05%
2.49%
Convictions/Reports
2.12%
1.42%
2.17%
Convictions/Arrests
63.14%
46.51%
87%

2 comments:

zuppa said...

Interesting data although flawed. First, without getting into flaws, every case involving an arrest is a "Fraud's Bureau Case" by virtue of the fact that the Fraud's Bureau is contacted by state and federal authorities as well as insurance companies re: every insurance fraud case in the state. It then becomes the frauds bureau's case.

Not a lot of arrests statewide. In 2008 61 arrests came from just one Operation "Direct Hit" -- Queens DA/FAIS/FBI.

Convictions are from arrests made in many cases more then a year after the arrest. Of course convictions do have some correlation to the strength of the case. But remember the vast majority of convictions are obtained via the plea bargain. Few cases go to trial. However those that do go to trial usually end in convictions -- Alexander Rozenberg comes to mind.

Arrests are meaningful. Obviously complaints are not very meaningful in terms of proven wrongdoing. What a horrible percentage.

Roy A. Mura said...

Before castigating these stats, bear in mind that an IFB report is not a "complaint" in the same way as a criminal complaint that often leads to an arrest is. IFB reports are also mandatory, and insurers report a variety of situations in which actual or attempted fraud may or may not exist, but merely be suspected. The low arrests/reports and convictions/reports percentages aren't horrible when understood in this context. Civil libertarians should be encouraged by those low percentages and by the meaty convictions/arrests percentages. Suggests that the IFB is doing a good job in making arrests in cases that are meritorious.

Are you advocating that the IFB should make more arrests based on insurers' reports, Ray? Don't think so.