The following information was provided by the Burlington County Prosecutor’s Office.
A Mt. Laurel man who owns a landscaping and tree cutting business was arrested yesterday for falsely reporting the theft of equipment and collecting money for the items from his insurance company.
The 29-year-old man was charged with one count of submitting a fraudulent insurance claim, one count of theft by deception and one count of filing a false report.
He was taken into custody yesterday at the Burlington County Prosecutor’s Office. He was released after posting $75,000 bail, with 10 percent permissible. The case will be sent to a Burlington County Grand Jury to determine whether he should be indicted.
The investigation revealed that in February 2013, the man reported to Mt. Laurel police that more than 20 pieces of equipment used by his businesses had been stolen, including backpack blowers, chainsaws, grass trimmers and pole saws. The man, who owns Lorraine Farms Enterprises as well as Expert Tree Service by Lorraine Farms, submitted claims to his insurance company and received $7,500 to cover the cost of the equipment he reported stolen.
The investigation revealed that his businesses still possessed several of the same items he indicated in the police report had been stolen. Search warrants were executed Wednesday morning at three locations in Mt. Laurel, including the defendant’s home, his father’s residence in the 5000 block of Church Road and a property in the 1500 block of Hainesport-Mt. Laurel Road that is used by the businesses to store equipment. Several of the items he reported to police had been stolen were recovered during the searches.
The investigation, which is continuing, is being conducted by detectives from Mt. Laurel Police Department and the Burlington County Prosecutor’s Office’s insurance fraud unit, major crimes unit and high-tech crimes unit.
