FRAUDULENT CLAIMS.

Waikato Times, Volume 121, Issue 20267, 9 August 1937, Page 6

FRAUDULENT CLAIMS.

INSURANCE COMPANIES SUFFER. VAST AMERICAN RACKET. The existence of a “school" where persons wishing to make fraudulent claims on Insurance companies are trained to simulate heart trouble has been revealed by a new anti-racketeer-ing drive in New York, says the London “Daily Telegraph." Every year huge sums are paid' to people who deceive the most sceptical physicians. Already thirty arrests have been made, among them those of several doctors and lawyers. The Government's witnesses include nine men and women who have been threatened with death If they give j evidence. They are being guarded day and night by detectives who are taking the precaution-of lodging their charges in a different hotel every evening. According to the United States At- j torney, Mr Lamar Hardy, who is directing the investigation, the usual procedure in putting an insured per- 1 son into a fit condition to claim benefits, which may run as high as £2OO a month for life, Is to enrol him in the so-oalled “heart trouble school." j Here he is taught to make a physical ■ wreck of himself by running up and down flights of stairs and taking long walks. When extreme fatigue has been induced, a strong dose of digitalis is injected, causing the heart to beat; spasmodically. If necessary, patients are removed to a hospital, where a doctor, employed by the racketeers, continues this un- i ethical “treatment" until the specialist | representing the insurance company can be satisfied that the claim is genuine.