SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, Jan. 20, 2016 (Gephardt Daily) — A Holladay man has been charged with deliberately causing at least 23 small crashes in order to obtain more than $55,000 in insurance money.
Navid Monjazeb, 35, was arrested and booked into the Salt Lake County Jail Wednesday morning. Charges brought by the Utah Attorney General’s office alleged he collected insurance payments for the crashes he intentionally caused between Jan. 5, 2010 and Dec. 22, 2015.
Charges resulting from a months-long investigation conducted by the State of Utah Insurance Fraud Division were filed against Monjazeb Wednesday.
A statement from Steve Gooch, spokesman for Utah State Insurance Department, said Monjazeb, while driving the same three vehicles, was involved in nearly two dozen crashes.
“Many of the accidents occurred at the same location with similar circumstances,” the statement said. “All accidents occurred in the Salt Lake County area. In nearly all cases, Monjazeb intentionally collided with or placed his vehicle in a position where the accident was a complete certainty.
“Monjazeb would aggressively assert that the other driver was at fault and would intimidate them to the point that they would sign prepared statements that they were at fault in the accident. Monjazeb would push the victims for a cash settlement without calling police. When police were called, they placed the victim at fault based on the assertions of Monjazeb.
“Monjazeb’s vehicles all had pre-existing damages which he blamed on the accident. The victim vehicles usually had very minimal damage with repairs being paid for out of pocket, while Monjazeb’s vehicles had thousands of dollars in damages paid for by the victim’s insurance company.
“Monjazeb collected the insurance money while electing to not have the damage repaired or claiming to have repaired the vehicle himself. Monjazeb exaggerated his damages and provided forged repair documents to increase his payouts from insurance.”
The news release said insurance companies paid for the same damages from accident to accident. In addition to the $55,000 or more Monjazeb was paid from insurance carriers alone, it is unknown how many additional accidents may have occurred wherein police and insurance carriers were not contacted and victims paid Monjazeb in cash.
Monjazeb was charged with pattern of unlawful activity, a second degree felony; 12 counts of insurance fraud, all third degree felonies; two counts of forgery, both third degree felonies; and seven counts of reckless endangerment, all class A misdemeanors.
