Man Goes to Jail for Playing Games With Disability Claim

A Montebello man who was seeking disability insurance when he was videotaped playing a game of soccer was sentenced Wednesday to 120 days in Orange County jail for filing a fraudulent workers’ compensation claim, authorities said.

Guillermo Gonzalez Roman, 30, pleaded guilty earlier this summer to felony counts of grand theft and filing a false workers’ compensation claim, Deputy Dist. Atty. Patti Nicholls said. In addition to the jail time, Roman was ordered to pay back the $10,300 he had collected through the claim and was put on three years’ formal probation.

His sentencing Wednesday in Municipal Court in Newport Beach before Judge Craig Robison was the culmination of an investigation by the Orange County district attorney’s office and American International Cos. of Costa Mesa, which paid the claim between July, 1992, and August, 1993.

Roman, while working at Tomco Auto Products in Los Angeles, alleged he had injured his back on July 24, 1992, while lifting a 50-pound basket of carburetors. He documented constant pain in his waist, hips and legs in making his request for a permanent disability award, Nicholls said. He was placed on restricted work duties at Tomco.

Investigators, acting on a tip, later discovered that after his request for disability, Roman had played in several “highly aggressive” California Soccer League games, Nicholls said. A private investigator videotaped him playing soccer with no apparent discomfort. He was arrested in November, 1993.

The videotape was the key to winning a conviction in the case, Nicholls said.

“How often do you get them on videotape?” she asked. “There are so many that are hard to prove.”

At his sentencing, Roman paid back $3,100. Of the $10,300 paid in his claim, he actually pocketed about $1,100, with the rest going toward medical expenses, Nicholls said.