For Minnesotan Travis Magdalena Scott, insurance fraud was a handy way of making a living. That is, it was until a US District Judge sentenced him to 12 years in federal prison and an ordered restitution of $11.5mn in bogus claims.
Before Monday, Scott was on the run following a series of increasingly audacious insurance scams over the past seven years.
Scott began his audacious sams in 2006 when he claimed lightning struck his business in Crystal, Minn. He got his payout, so Scott decided that, for him, lightning really would strike twice. In 2008, he claimed his supercomputer business had been struck by lightning, ruining his equipment.
Zurich North America bought into his deceit and paid him roughly $11.5mn for the loss of the supercomputers.
By this time, Minnesota authorities were starting to cotton on to Scott’s lightning-based prosperity and raided his home and airport hangar in 2010, where they seized a 1981 DeLorean, a 46-foot cabin cruiser and three airplanes.
After pleading guilty to fraud in May 2011, Scott concocted a new plan to disappear entirely. He placed a kayak on Minnesota’s Lake Mille Lacs, along with a suicide note claiming he weighed himself down and drown in the 207-square mile lake.
While waiting for others to discover his “suicide,” Scott flew another plane to Canada, where he was later arrested for trying to pass forged prescriptions in a Winnipeg pharmacy.
Scott served a 22-month jail stint for his crimes before returning to St. Paul to face the music for his insurance scams. A representative from Zurich, who paid out for the bogus settlement, was present for the proceedings.
Prosecutors told Judge Donovan Frank that Scott “has shown himself to be a person with a limitless capacity for deceit.”
“There is very little question that the defendant will engage in fraud once again whenever he is released from prison,” they said in court filings.
Judge Frank apparently agreed with prosecutors, and Scott is destined for 12 years and eight months in prison. He will also be responsible for paying back the phony insurance settlement.
