North Carolina authorities have charged a Battleboro insurance agent with 74 counts after they said he forged life insurance applications for 16 people.
Jonathan Michael Vlasak, 35, a licensed producer qualified to sell property, casualty, life and accident insurance, took out life insurance policies on the individuals and attempted to obtain some $8,200 from Occidental Life Insurance Co. and $3,750 from Americo Life Insurance, the North Carolina Department of Insurance reported.
“This was an extraordinary case and I thank our agents for staying with the investigation and uncovering this scheme,” state Insurance Commissioner Mike Causey said in a statement. “Consumers need to be extra vigilant to protect sensitive information such as this from getting into the hands of the wrong person.”
Investigators with the department charged Vlasak with 25 counts of forgery, 25 counts of identity theft, 22 counts of obtaining property by false pretenses and two counts of attempting to obtain property, all of which are felonies.
Vlasak was arrested this week and released on a $100,000 bond.
The National Association of Insurance Commissioners’ license-check site shows that Vlasak has been licensed since 2017. He is currently appointed with seven life insurers, but not with Occidental or Americo. He could not be reached Friday morning at the phone number listed on the license lookup page.
It’s the second arrest this week of a Southeastern U.S. insurance agent allegedly attempting to forge policy applications with Americo. In Florida, authorities charged a Fort Myers producer with writing life insurance policies on a person without the person’s consent, and fraudulently using the person’s identification information.
Topics Agencies