Legislative Update Howard Goldblatt Director of Government Affairs Coalition Against Insurance Fraud www.InsuranceFraud.org Starts and Stops New Laws Put Brakes on Automobile Scammers M ost state legislatures have closed their doors for the year. Several states finished with a flourish, enacting laws that set up roadblocks against crash rings, sham medical clinics, and other automobile chiselers. Minnesota The state's Commerce Department gained power to lodge civil actions against fraudsters. The agency also now can kick fraudsters out of the insurance system, blocking crooks from receiving insurance payouts. The two provisions went into effect on Aug. 1, 2015. The measures were added to an omnibus jobs bill during a special session after the statehouse shut down for the year. The Coalition urged both ideas when the state started marching toward strengthening its antifraud efforts two years ago. They made it into a succession of bills, including the omnibus version. Another provision-limiting commercial use of police crash reports-was left out of the omnibus bill. It may be revisited in 2016. The new laws will be especially useful against organized crash rings moving into the state and inflicting large losses on auto insurers with bogus claims. New Jersey Drivers who falsely register and insure their vehicles in other states to illicitly avoid paying New Jersey's high auto www.iasiu.org premiums have a new worry: The state passed a Coalition-backed law making auto-premium evasion a specific crime, with stiff penalties. New Jersey drivers pay the highest auto insurance rates in the nation, says the most recent NAIC survey on insurance rates. Honest consumers subsidize the insurance premiums of drivers who cheat the system. The law culminates a multi-year effort. The Coalition testified in the statehouse, and we worked closely with the bill sponsors and other partners on the bill's wording and strategy for moving the bill through the statehouse. This new law also gives fraud fighters a model to export to other states where drivers are dodging high auto premiums. Fall 2015 SIU Today 15http://www.InsuranceFraud.org http://www.iasiu.org