Russian Mob Using Illegal Aliens in Fake Injury Scam to Bilk NYC for Billions

Adding to how the current migrant crisis is destroying New York City, the NY Post recently reported on a collaboration between the Russian Mafia and the brutal gang MS-13 that is using the flood of migrants in the Big Apple in a “fake injury” scam that is costing billions!

The scam also involves a cadre of corrupt surgeons, lawyers, and lenders. The con: bogus personal injury lawsuits where immigrants go under the knife to help their twisted ruse. Migrants and other desperate New Yorkers are pressured into getting unneeded spinal fusion surgery and other operations to boost the value of their fake accident claims, according to court records, insurance investigators, and law enforcement sources.

Doctors cash in on the sick swindle by performing back and neck fusions, allowing fraudsters to swipe billions through bogus insurance filings, according to court filings and Post sources. 

The racket typically involves a healthy person taking a seemingly minor tumble on the street or at a construction site, then claiming a devastating injury that requires multiple surgeries. A crooked surgeon fuses healthy vertebrae with screws and plates, leading to a lawsuit against a business or landlord, or both. Settlements start at $1 million each but can go much higher.

One-five is now on the cheap side,” said an insurance industry lawyer who asked for anonymity.

These scams rely on law firms that take on hundreds of such cases, along with high-profile doctors, sketchy lending firms that hard-sell migrants into borrowing to cover the costs, and an army of “runners” who recruit victims and orchestrate their falls, according to legal papers and sources familiar with the mix of schemes. 

The set-up is fed by a seemingly endless supply of low-income dupes willing to risk their health for a quick score.

“They’re regularly recruiting migrants and homeless people and in some cases are proactively arranging for them to come to New York,” a private investigator told The Post.

Russian hoodlums are suspected of running lending firms that fund trip-and-fall lawsuits and surgeries — often at hugely inflated rates to goose settlement figures, sources told The Post. “They’re well-versed in this kind of thing,” said a recently retired NYPD supervisor. 

MS-13 gang leaders provide a pipeline of Hispanic migrants, some who are brought to New York specifically to fake injuries, sources said. They said the gang ropes in unsuspecting border crossers with offers to drive them to the city, pay for meals, and provide spending cash before pressuring them into phony accidents.

A private investigator said an MS-13 informant at a construction company revealed plans for a worker to fall off a ladder — and it happened just as the tipster said it would, said the sleuth, who declined to say where or when the fraud occurred to protect the identity of his source.

Setting up fake falls is “so successful for MS-13,” he said. “Rival gangs are now trying it.”

 Insurance insiders claim losses have tripled since the pandemic, with payouts so massive they’re driving up the cost of living for all New Yorkers. 

One insurer, Tradesman Program Managers insurance firm of Poughkeepsie, a carrier covering contractors and construction companies in the city, says it forked over $142 million in 2022, three times the $36 million it paid out in 2018. It claims it has been hit with 650 allegedly fraudulent suits over the last four years.

“We’re talking billions collectively across the city,” said an insurance executive who asked not to be identified.

The scams are ballooning costs for insurance, housing, construction, food, utilities, and basic living expenses, sources say.

New York already has the third highest average car insurance rate in the country, with minimum liability costing $1,472 per year, the fifth highest rate for individual health insurance at $736 per month, and the second highest workers’ compensation costs.