Injury fraud evidence ‘utterly compelling’

A group of Romanians, mainly based in Galway, had been linked to Irish Travellers in an utterly dishonest scam of staging car crashes to mount fraudulent personal injury claims, a judge stated yesterday.

Mr Justice Raymond Groarke said the people who gained from the profit-making criminal activities were paying Roma drivers for crashing their cars into other vehicles.

Conor Kearney, for Aviva Insurance Ltd, told the Circuit Civil Court that the company was challenging 79 outstanding claims. He said 60% of the claims were around Galway, and the company would be alleging they had been fraudulently staged or had never taken place.