The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1886-01-15
CURIOUS ATTEMPTS AT FRAUD.

some OF the Hard Cases that Life Insurance
Companies Have to Deal With.
New York Mail and Express.
"A number of curious instances of attempts to
defraud LIE insurance companies were related at
the recent convention held in Boston of a num-
Der OF companies" said the attorney of we'll
known lie insurance company, to a reporter yes
terday. Zone was of man in Catskill, N. Y,
who made application for $4,000 insurance for
the benefit of himself and obtained it, and
shortly afterwards obtained an accident
policy of $1,000 in a New England
pany l can best give the story in
the language of the gentleman who told it and
In whose company the 600 policy was OBJ
tanned. The first we heard of the case, he
said, was telegram that the insured referred
to had been drowned. My experience in insur
ance has led me to look with suspicion upon all
accidental or mysterious disappearance. We
therefore sent an agent to Catskill, who reported
that the party. In company with his brother and
boy, had been out fishing at IL o'clock at night
in the Catskill creek, near its confluence with
the Hudson river, and that he took to
ascertain the depth of the water lost his balance
and fell overheard. Search was made for the
body by the citizens of the town in the waters of
the Hudson, while we were searching for the
body on land. It would be tedious to tell you
the skillful work it required, hut suffice it to say
that We found the would be corpse in Cleveland
o.. and on his person found a correspondence
written IN cipher and also the key to it, which
disclosed an Infamous conspiracy A case told
by the representative of another company showed
how an agent tried to secure money fraudulent
iy from company. The insurance was effected
through an application presented in the name of
James w. Heirs, of Norfolk, Va. The agent
sent on the application Itwas perfectly clear.
The man who had been examined stood six feet
one inch ana weighed 100 pounds His measure
ments were correct The examination was
made by one of the finest and best physicians in
the city of Norfolk, and the certificate was of
course written. Through the custom which had
been adopted by the association of local treas
urers, receipt was forwarded for the collection
of the annual dues to the local
treasurer, at the same time that the policy
was sent to the agent The local treasurer re-
ported back to the home Office that he could not
find any such man as James w. Heirs; there was
a man by that name who had lived there in the
November previous this application being made
to the association the latter part Of February,
some five months after the decease of the par ty
insured The beneficiary under the policy was
friend of the agent, the party whom he had sub
stituted at the time of making the examination,
to whom the money was to be paid in trust for
the widow. He was also mentioned in the ap-
plea ton one of the friends of the applicant
A fictitious set OF proofs were in all probability
to be presented to the association In sixty or
ninety days, or four months, by the friend of the
agent making the claim for the money. which
would have been paid to him, if the company
had not investigated the matter. in trust for the
widow, who never would have heard of it. She
was satisfied before her husband died, in No
vember, that he had obtained some insurance in
some company. and probably these two men who
put up this job had insured this man in some
other company, making the policy payable in
some manner to themselves, and had received
the amount of the insurance. ExN
Another class of frauds upon rs are people
who have cancers and know it. A typical case
of tho kind was discovered last summer. The
man whc ian4 tho eananr obtained $4,000 insur-
ance on his life On investigation it was found
that he had been suffering from it for FIVE years,
and that he had been treated thirteen years be-
fore, and had been an inmate of hospital It
was also found in the investigation that twenty
two different physicians had treated the man, al
though in his application to the company mo-
was the answer given to the question whether he
had been treated by any physician within five
years. The certificate was made payable to his
estate and assigned to his wife. It was found
that this woman knew the facts in the case"
''How about suicides?"
'In the knights of Honor, two or three years
ego, from Is to 20 per cent. of the death losses
were from suicides They passed resolution
in their supreme body to prohibit the payment
of claims from suicide, and their experience has
been since that time that they have not had one
quarter of the number of cases of suicide as be-
fore 1t is singular fact, as shown in our
experience that persons intending to COM
nit suicide determine upon the act long
beforehand, and go about it deliberately. A
recent case In point was man who came to the
Office of one of our companies and said that he
wanted to get insured. He was given q copy of
the companys certificate and went away. The
next day he returned and said that he did not like
the suicide clause. He asked his reasons.
He said he might go out hunting and accidentally
fan down and get shot, and the company would
claim that he committed suicide So he thought
he would look up some other company A short
time afterward he committed suicide, and not
while out hunting. either"