Need some extra money? Cool. Get a job. Or ask somebody for a loan. Or if you get really, really desperate, head down to the pawn shop and pawn one of your valuables. But do not—we repeat, do not—try what a woman from West Palm Beach, Fla. tried a couple years ago.
Back in early 2012, Lindela Edmonds, 44, took her car to a place called Queen of Pawns and told them that she wanted to pawn it. They agreed to take it off her hands and paid her $5,500 for it. But Edmonds didn't stop there. In an effort to get even more money for the car, she then called her insurance company GEICO and told them that her car had been stolen. They processed her claim, paid her a little more than $12,000, and sent her on her way. Only one problem: Her car obviously hadn't been stolen. So it took awhile, but eventually, Edmonds' plan backfired.
A little less than a year later, the owner of Queen of Pawns realized that Edmonds wasn't coming back for her car. So he decided to sell it. However, the car came back stolen when he went to start the paperwork process to sell the car. And police were later able to figure out what Edmonds had tried to do. Using a pawn transaction receipt as evidence, they tracked her down this week, placed her under arrest, and charged her with insurance fraud and making a false report of a non-existent crime. So she could now face jail time for trying to pawn her car and reporting it stolen.
She didn't really think she was going to get away with this, did she? Sigh. Sadly, it seems she did. And now, she's going to have to pay the price for it.
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[via Sun-Sentinel]
