(R) Congressman Garret Graves - District 6
If you’re wondering why your insurance rates are so high in Louisiana, Congressman Garret Graves it’s blamed in part on staged accidents, the most egregious example taking place in the Big Easy in recent years. “It was actually a ring of criminals in the New Orleans area that staged about 120 different traffic accidents,” said Graves. One staged accident led to a 4.7-million dollar settlement.
Graves has introduced bipartisan legislation, the Highway Accident Fairness Act of 2021, which is aimed at lowering insurance rates by making it a federal crime to stage a vehicle collision and fraudulently claim financial damages. Violators could face hefty fines into the millions of dollars and double-digit years of prison time.
Graves says these staged accidents have financial consequences beyond those directly attributed to the staged crashes, one ring said to be responsible for more than 100 of them. He says, “this isn’t just some criminal network that doesn’t have victims beyond those that were sued, this ends up raising insurance rates for all Louisiana drivers.”
The bill Graves introduced targets those involved in staging accidents, fraudulently collecting from insurance companies, and in turn leading to higher insurance rates for the public. “It brings the federal resources of the government to the table, to hold these people accountable, to put them in jail and charge them fines and other types of penalties to make sure we catch these folks early in the process,” said Graves.
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