One of the most popular types of fraud is the worker’s compensation fraud that costs Americans $5 billion dollars a year. Employees and employers can commit worker’s compensation fraud when they misrepresent facts to gain personal benefits that they are not legally entitled to or when they withhold awarding rightly owned benefits to employees.

Our latest case is about Emily Hegner, who was a 34 year old who worked for the Department of Public Health. Hegner claimed she injured her lower back, left hip and right wrist while working at Laguna Honda Hospital. She was getting workers compensation benefits from the city, for these injuries she sustained.

Between July 2007 and September 2010, Hegner reported pain and difficulty walking during her medical evaluations and treatments, and claimed she needed to use a cane and wrist splint, according to the district attorney’s office.

However when she was receiving benefits, Hegner was able to run a challenging 7 mile part of a marathon. Then six days later she went to her physician using a cane and requesting a handicap placard, she failed to disclose that she had run in a race, according to the district attorney’s office.

Her story and lies started to unravel and she now faces 10 felony charges: five counts of workers’ compensation insurance fraud, one count of preparing false documents, three counts of insurance fraud, and one count of grand theft, prosecutors said.

The charges carry a potential maximum sentence of nine years and eight months in state prison, plus payment of restitution.

Find out what you need to know about a new employee’s past workers compensation claims! Be prepared with workers compensation knowledge before any problems occur! Do an employment screening on all of your employees. Don’t risk not knowing about a new employees past workers compensation claims!