Sunday, 13 October 2024

State officials offer details on insurance agent arrest; attorney calls case 'frivolous'

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – The California Department of Insurance on Thursday offered additional details about the case in which a local insurance agent was charged with embezzlement, allegations his attorney said is frivolous and baseless.


California Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner's office said Glenn Neasham, 50, was arrested Tuesday based on an investigation conducted by his agency.


“Insurance agents or brokers who steal from vulnerable seniors will not get away with their shameful tricks,” said Commissioner Poizner. “CDI investigators will continue working to track down any unscrupulous agent who preys on California's seniors.”


Neasham is charged with felony theft from an elder with two special allegations, the first for taking or damaging more than $50,000 in property and the second for a theft that is alleged to have totaled more than $100,000.


Lakeport attorney Mitchell Hauptman, who is representing Neasham, called the case “another one of the DA's famous flights of fantasy.”


Senior Deputy District Attorney said Neasham could face five years in prison if convicted, with four years for the first count, an additional year for the first special allegation and a limitation on probation if he were found guilty of the second special allegation.


The Lake County District Attorney's Office filed the case based on the state investigation, which began in 2008 after the California Department of Insurance received a report from the Savings Bank of Mendocino County.


Neasham, doing business as Glenn Neasham Insurance Agency, is alleged to have sold a $175,000 annuity to a then-83-year-old client on Feb. 6, 2008.


The Savings Bank of Mendocino County alerted local officials after the alleged victim and her elderly boyfriend came in to withdraw $175,000 from a certificate of deposit to purchase the annuity in February 2008, court records showed.


Abelson said banks are mandatory reporters in such cases, with the reports often going to Adult Protective Services, local law enforcement or other agencies.


Hauptman said that the court documents actually allege no wrongdoing, and the alleged victim neither suffered a loss nor filed a complaint.


The California Department of Insurance said the investigation determined that the alleged victim lacked the mental capacity to enter into this contract, and that the terms and conditions of the annuity contract were not in her best financial interest.


In the investigative reports the state investigator found that the woman who purchased the annuity appeared confused at times. The woman also was said to be under the control of her boyfriend, who was named as the beneficiary on the annuity rather than the woman's son, with whom she reportedly had a strained relationship.


The son of the alleged victim told the state investigator that his mother had Alzheimer's, but Neasham told the investigator he was not aware that the woman had any such condition.


“It is insulting to assume that just because she is old she lacks the capacity to manage her affairs,” Hauptman said.


No charges have been filed against the woman's boyfriend. Abelson said the investigation did not yield any findings of wrongdoing against the man, who had been a client of Neasham's for about 10 years at the time of the annuity's purchase, based on investigation documents.


Lake County News could not reach a California Department of Insurance spokesman by the end of Thursday to ask additional questions about the case.


Hauptman said in the nearly three years since the annuity was written, there has been no request for any change in its status, and it has actually shown a greater rate of return than the CD that was the previous financial arrangement.


In that time the woman has never requested any changes be made to the annuity, and she's making money, he said.


He said there is no evidence that Neasham received any particular benefit from the annuity sale, other than his normal commission on such a transaction.


Hauptman said that the state licenses agents to sell annuities, which have stringent requirements attached to them. He said the only thing that's suggested is that the woman purchasing the product didn't completely understand the product, which Hauptman said isn't a crime. “They're confusing products.”


The confusion the state investigator attributed to the woman who purchased the annuity “does not rise to justification for this frivolous criminal charge,” Hauptman said.


Hauptman said Neasham is set to make his first court appearance in the case in February.


The California Department of Insurance invites anyone who believes they may have been a victim of Neasham to call the agency at 707-751-2005.


E-mail Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow Lake County News on Twitter at http://twitter.com/LakeCoNews , on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Lake-County-News/143156775604?ref=mf and on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/user/LakeCoNews .

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