Whistleblower Suit Against State Farm Insurance Goes Forward

A whistleblower lawsuit filed under the False Claims Act, will be allowed to proceed in court against State Farm Insurance for filing trumped up claims to the federal government for flood damage. The lawsuit, filed by Cori Rigsby and Kerri Rigsby, who worked as claims representatives for E.A Renfroe providing disaster claims management services for State Farm Insurance and other insurers. The complaint in this case, alleges that the named insurers misallocated claims from those of hurricane coverage, which a company would be required to pay, to flood claims which could be submitted to the United States Treasury. To do this, the complaint says that State Farm would order an engineering survey on each claim involving certain buildings as it could save the company up to $350,000 on a homeowner’s claim. The case was filed in the United States District Court of Mississippi Southern District and under the False Claims Act, the whistleblowers could receive upto 25% of what the government recovers int he case. State Farm sought to dismiss the lawsuit because information about it was leaked to the press before it was unsealed.