SAN DIEGO/SAN FRANCISCO – San Diego Superior Court Judge David Danielsen ordered the owner of a San Diego area construction company to pay $475,563 in restitution to the State Compensation Insurance Fund as part of his sentence for committing workers’ compensation insurance premium fraud. Damian L. Seiler, 57, a licensed general contractor and owner of the Pacific Home Company, was also given jail time of 365 days and sentenced to five years probation.

Seiler was also ordered to pay the State Employment Development Department $232,768 in restitution. State Fund also received an additional $951 to pay for its investigative costs. In all, Seiler was ordered to pay total restitution costs of $709,283.

Seiler established his company in Solana Beach in 2000 and specialized in condo conversions. The fraud was uncovered after Seiler filed a workers’ compensation claim for an employee, even though he had never reported any wages for the employee to State Fund. State Fund performed an audit of Seiler’s company and found irregularities. State Fund referred the suspected fraud case to the San Diego County District Attorney’s Office in August 2005, and the DA’s Office subsequently served a search warrant on Pacific Home Company. As a result of the audit and the documents obtained from the search, it was determined that Seiler had underreported wages of his employees by more than $1.1 million in order to receive a lower insurance premium. 

“State Fund will continue to commit significant resources to help the San Diego County District Attorney’s Office and their counterparts statewide battle workers’ compensation fraud,” said Donna Gallagher, who manages State Fund's Fraud Investigation Program (FIP). “We applaud the San Diego District Attorney’s Office’s commitment to investigating and prosecuting workers’ compensation fraud so vigorously.”
 
State Fund’s Fraud Investigation Program (FIP) addresses all aspects of workers’ compensation insurance fraud, including employee, employer, medical and legal. In the last decade, State Fund’s FIP has produced hundreds of arrests and convictions in a wide range of workers’ compensation cases, including some considered milestones in California’s fight against fraud.

Editor’s Note: Established by the California Legislature in 1914, State Compensation Insurance Fund is a nonprofit, and wholly self-supporting public enterprise carrier that provides workers ’ compensation coverage at cost to all California employers.