Man Jailed For Insurance Fraud After Faking Death

Before running his successful furniture business, Jose Lantigua emigrated from Cuba and had a heroic military career.  Lantigua owned a Florida beachfront condo and a new home atop a North Carolina mountain. 

Despite these luxuries, in 2012, as his Circle K Furniture store slid into debt, Lantigua and his wife began planning to fake his death in order to scam almost $8 million from insurance companies. 

Now Lantigua and his wife, Daphne Simpson, are charged with insurance fraud after being arrested by federal agents last weekend.  His arrest marks the end of a long court battle between Lantigua’s family and insurance companies that refused to pay off his life policies because they did not think he was dead. 

See Associated Press, Suspicion Surrounded Florida Businessman Who Faked His Death, Tampa Bay Times, March 27, 2015.