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Galloway Featured in Insurance Journal’s Most Noteworthy Topics of 2020

Galloway was featured in Insurance Journal’s Most Noteworthy Topics of 2020 for our defense work in a civil case that ended up uncovering a crime ring to defraud insurance companies, commercial carriers, and trucking companies.

James Prather and Bowman Fetzer successfully defended a civil lawsuit in what was originally thought to be a legitimate, multi-million dollar trucking lawsuit. However, during the course of litigation James and Bowman uncovered significant evidence establishing that the accident was part of an elaborate scheme involving the plaintiffs, their attorney, and other witnesses acting as “spotters” and “slammers” who set up and intentionally caused the collision to defraud Galloway’s client and cash-in on a large payday in litigation.

The civil case has now resolved. But, based in large part upon the evidence developed in the civil case connecting the scheme to their accident, as well as numerous others, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana has brought indictments against the plaintiffs, their attorney, and two witnesses involved in intentionally causing the accident.

At least 33 defendants have now been charged in the federal probe, now aptly dubbed “Operation Sideswipe,” and 11 have pleaded guilty and admitted their participation in the scheme. The plaintiffs in James and Bowman’s civil case were one of the first to plead guilty. Their attorney, Patrick Keating, is the most recent to be indicted by the grand jury. All face a maximum of five years in prison and a fine of $250,000 each.

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