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13-P-1746 Appeals Court

COMMONWEALTH vs. VIRGEN MILLIE LIMA.

No. 13-P-1746.

Suffolk. November 13, 2014. - July 22, 2015.

Present: Cypher, Fecteau, & Massing, JJ.

Motor Vehicle, Insurance. Insurance, Motor vehicle insurance, 

Defrauding insurer. Fraud. Larceny. False Pretenses.

Practice, Criminal, Required finding.

Indictments found and returned in the Superior Court 

Department on March 11, 2010. 

The cases were tried before Regina L. Quinlan, J. 

Charles Allan Hope for the defendant.

Christopher Hurld, Assistant Attorney General, for the 

Commonwealth.

CYPHER, J. The defendant, Virgen Millie Lima, appeals from 

convictions by a Superior Court jury of two counts of motor 

vehicle insurance fraud under G. L. c. 266, § 111B, and two 
2

counts of larceny under G. L. c. 266, § 30.1 The defendant 

argues that there was insufficient evidence of intent to defraud 

and that she did not commit larceny by false pretenses, because 

there was no property stolen from Safety Insurance Company 

(Safety Insurance). We affirm.

Background. The charges against the defendant arose from 

an investigation by the Massachusetts Insurance Fraud Bureau 

(IFB), which was prompted by two referrals from Safety Insurance

involving the same car dealership and the same insurance agency. 

The investigation began in 2008 while the defendant was employed 

as a licensed insurance agent by Brighton Insurance Agency in 

Brighton (Brighton Insurance). Following the IFB investigation, 

in which the investigator discovered a pattern of commercial 

vehicle policies involving undocumented drivers, a report of the

findings was submitted to the office of the Attorney General. 

After review, that office sought indictments from a grand jury 

that charged the defendant with fraudulent statements or 

representations in three applications for commercial automobile 

insurance, prepared by the defendant and submitted by Brighton 

 

1 The defendant was found not guilty of one count of 

insurance fraud.
3

Insurance to Safety Insurance. The defendant also was charged

with larceny in respect to those policies.

2 

Facts. A significant portion of Brighton Insurance's

business involved serving a large influx of Brazilian 

immigrants, many of whom had Brazilian driver's licenses. 

Brighton Insurance actively sought their business by advertising

that it had staff fluent in Spanish and Portuguese, including 

the defendant. Similarly, many customers of an automobile 

agency, Inman Motors in Somerville, were Brazilian, and were 

referred to Brighton Insurance for their insurance needs. They 

were assisted in making that connection through the efforts of 

Wanderson Silva, one of Inman's employees.

Gordon Owades, the majority partner in Brighton Insurance, 

testified that sometime in 2004 he was required by the insurance 

companies for which he sold policies to refuse applications 

based on Brazilian licenses. At that time, the defendant

suggested to Silva that they turn to commercial motor vehicle 

insurance. The Commonwealth theorizes the defendant concluded

that drivers with foreign licenses, who could not obtain 

 

2 "The insurance fraud bureau of Massachusetts is . . . a 

private entity, . . . authorized by special act to combat 

insurance fraud in the workers' compensation and automobile 

insurance systems by investigating charges of such fraud and 

referring suspected violations for criminal prosecution." Adams

v. Liberty Mut. Ins. Co., 60 Mass. App. Ct. 55, 58 n.7 (2003).
4

personal motor vehicle insurance, might be able to operate under 

a commercial policy.

3

Discussion. The defendant's argument, that there was 

insufficient evidence of an intent to defraud, mistakenly relies 

on two cases of motor vehicle insurance fraud under 

G. L. c. 266, § 111B, where the fraud alleged concerned the 

claims made under the insurance policies.

4 The defendant

overlooks that the charges against her concern fraud made in 

applications for insurance, an alternate ground of fraud 

proscribed by wording inserted in § 111B by St. 1988, c. 273, 

§ 60, as noted in the margin.

5

The indictments in this case charged the defendant with 

"fraudulent statement(s) or representation(s) of any fact or 

thing material to such a claim in violation of G. L. c. 266, 

 

3 The Commonwealth, citing G. L. c. 90, §§ 3, 10, contends

that "Massachusetts law generally requires drivers with foreign 

licenses to obtain a Massachusetts driver's license within 

thirty days of acquiring a place of abode or employment in the 

Commonwealth. . . . Drivers who maintain motor vehicle 

liability insurance in the required amounts are excluded from 

this requirement. . . . Drivers with foreign licenses may drive 

vehicles registered to others, including businesses." Compare 

Commonwealth v. Chown, 76 Mass. App. Ct. 684, 688 (2010).

4 See Corson v. Commonwealth, 428 Mass. 193 (1998); 

Commonwealth v. Jerome, 56 Mass. App. Ct. 726 (2002).

5 General Laws c. 266, § 111B, which formerly stated that 

"[w]hoever, in connection with or in support of any claim under 

any motor vehicle . . . insurance policy"; now provides, "in 

connection with or in support of any application for or claim" 

(emphasis supplied).
5

§ 111B," in connection with applications for Vitorino Painting 

and New Generation Services. Accordingly, we now examine 

whether the Commonwealth's evidence, viewed according to 

Commonwealth v. Latimore, 378 Mass. 671, 676-677 (1979), was 

sufficient to show that the defendant made false statements in 

these applications, intending to deceive Safety Insurance.

6

The two applications we examine are on a standard form and 

require the following principal information: name and address 

of insured; address of premises; nature of business; and names 

of all drivers who will drive company vehicles and employees who 

will drive their own vehicles on company business. 

The Vitorino Painting application was signed by the 

applicant, Rodrigo Almeida Junior, who was friendly with the 

defendant. No further information on him or his relationship to 

the business appeared on the application. The address of the 

premises for Vitorino Painting was shown as the defendant's home 

address and she was listed as the only driver. The only other 

 

6 General Laws c. 266, § 111B, states in relevant part:

"Whoever, in connection with or in support of any 

application for or claim under any motor vehicle . . . 

policy issued by an insurer, and with intent to injure, 

defraud or deceive such insurer knowingly presents to it, . 

. . any notice, statement, or proof of loss, whether or not 

the same is under oath or is required or authorized by law 

or the terms of such policy, knowing that such notice, 

statement or proof of loss contains any false or fraudulent 

statement or representation of any fact or thing material 

to such application or claim, shall be punished."
6

information, a vehicle registration, showed Almeida's home 

address in Brighton.

The New Generation Services application was signed by the 

applicant, Cledimar S. Lopes. The application listed Lopes's

residential address as the business premises, but included no 

further information about her or her relationship to the 

business. The defendant was listed as the only driver and a 

copy of her driver's license and driving history were attached.

7

The defendant falsely listed herself as the only driver of 

company vehicles in both applications. Brighton Insurance,

however, was her only employer and there was no evidence that 

she worked for either business. In the Vitorino application she 

falsely stated her home address as the address of the business. 

Moreover, the investigator for the IFB testified that he 

observed no commercial activity at either address given for the 

businesses, and could not locate either of the applicants --

Almeida or Lopes. This evidence is sufficient to show that the 

defendant's processing of these applications contained 

 

7 With each application was a copy of a Massachusetts 

vehicle registration application for registration of a vehicle 

in the name of the business. Each application included a 

Federal employer identification number (EIN). Lima applied for 

and obtained that number contemporaneously with the commercial 

insurance application. Each application for registration was

stamped by Safety Insurance certifying that the vehicle was

insured.
7

materially false statements she knew to be false and were made 

with the intent to deceive Safety Insurance.

Finally, there is no merit in the defendant's argument that 

because no property was stolen from Safety Insurance, larceny by 

false pretenses could not have been committed. General Laws 

c. 266, § 30(1), states: "Whoever steals, or with intent to 

defraud obtains by a false pretence, . . . the property of 

another as defined in this section, . . . shall be guilty of 

larceny." Section 30(2) defines property to include "any 

valuable contract in force." "An insurance policy is 'property' 

within the statute because it is a 'valuable contract in force." 

Commonwealth v. Levin, 11 Mass. App. Ct. 482, 496 (1981). 

Safety Insurance relied on misrepresentations and false 

statements in the applications, and thereby was induced to part 

with insurance policies. See Commonwealth v. Gall, 58 Mass.

App. Ct. 278, 287 (2003).

Judgments affirmed.