Wissinoming man charged with auto-insurance fraud

Some people shop around for the best car-insurance quote.

Keith Lewis just ripped the companies off, investigators with the district attorney's insurance- fraud unit said yesterday.

Lewis, 41, of Erdrick Street near Sanger in Wissinoming, was arrested yesterday on 62 counts of insurance fraud and 22 counts of identity theft and related charges for fraudulent activity he is charged with committing from 1999 to July 2007, the D.A.'s office said.

From February 2002 to May 2003, Lewis obtained four separate automobile-insurance policies from Progressive Insurance Co. for vehicles registered in his name, the D.A.'s office said.

In each case, he provided initial payments to Progressive drawn from bank accounts that he had opened in his name that had no money in them, according to Linda Perkins, chief of the D.A.'s insurance fraud unit.

Days after the policy went into effect and before Progressive discovered that Lewis had no money to cover the insurance payments, Lewis filed four separate claims that his newly insured car had been vandalized or struck while parked on the street.

Progressive denied Lewis' claims and reported him to authorities, investigators said.

After Progressive reported Lewis' duplicity, the fraud unit uncovered 70 additional insurance claims involving Lewis and six other insurance companies.

In 22 of the 70 additional claims Lewis made, he used the identity of an unidentified Philadelphia man whom he didn't know. Investigators said he stole the man's identity through a lost driver's license.

Lewis is awaiting a preliminary hearing, Perkins said. *