Associate David A. Wiseman imposed a three-year imprisonment, all suspended except for 30 days, on Xin Mao Zheng, alias Amao, of Shun Fa Auto Shop for charges of theft by deception.
Zheng will be placed on two years of supervised probation upon his release. He was also ordered to cooperate in the prosecution of his co-defendants on the case.
Wiseman ordered Zheng to write a letter of apology to AON Insurance Micronesia (Saipan), pay a fine of $500 and an assessment fee of $100, plus probation fee. His prison term will begin at the Department of Corrections on Dec. 3, 2008 at 8 a.m.
The Attorney General’s Officer charged Zheng with one count of conspiracy and two counts of theft by deception in July this year. He entered into a plea agreement with his counsel Vicente T. Salas and pleaded guilty to one count of theft by deception. The government agreed to dismiss the other charges.
Zheng’s plea agreement stated that he submitted a false police report on March 14, 2008 and falsified documents to report a fraudulent claim to AON Insurance and received $6,870 for it.
Zheng was arrested by police with another companion, Yuan Fu Li, also of Shun Fa Auto Shop, after another defendant Serafin Esperancilla, implicated their participation in the insurance scam.
Detective Patrick Earl Maanao earlier stated that Sgt. Hillary Tagabuel, the fourth defendant in the case, admitted forging 41 traffic crash reports to be able to collect insurance claims.
Maanao said the operators and owners of the vehicles were included in the forged TCRs were not even aware that their vehicles were involved in “accidents.”
