Saturday, April 27, 2013

Driven to desperation

Faced with the the harsh problems that the economic downturn has brought to many in Spain, some have resorted to desperate measures. We all recall that the government was forced to suspend the eviction of tenants in arrears after several committed suicide.

One solution for some is to make a fraudulent claim against their insurance policies. Last year, 150,000 investigations were made into such claims, a rise of 11.9% over the previous year.

None were as bizarre as the man who made claims to 11 different firms saying that he had lost his hand in a car accident. The investigation concluded that the angle of his turn and the speed of the car would not have produced that result and that the cut was too clean for it to have occurred in a traffic accident.

In a similar case last year, a man claimed 600,000 euros for an arm cut off above the elbow which he said was caused by an accident with an electric saw.

In both cases, the men will have to spend the rest of their lives with a severe incapacity for no good reason. 

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