Bartlett woman lied about ‘FBI agent’ husband before, ex-feds say
A Bartlett woman who admitted lying about the deaths of her young daughter and supposed FBI agent husband in an unusual insurance scam collected $60,000 four years ago after making nearly identical claims, two former federal agents said Tuesday.
Bridgette L. Buckner, 50, is facing up to seven years in prison for defrauding her former employer, Hallmark Services Corp., by $10,000 in 2008. A no-bail arrest warrant — her second in less than a week — was issued Tuesday after she failed to appear for sentencing in front of DuPage County Judge John Kinsella.
Prepared to testify at the hearing were former FBI agents Tom Bourgeois and Diane Rivers, who told reporters outside of court that Buckner received $60,000 in a similar scheme while working for HSBC in Wood Dale in 2007.
“There’s no doubt when she came to work for us, she came to scam us,” said Bourgeois, who along with Rivers investigated the scheme on Hallmark’s behalf as corporate security for Health Care Services Corp.
Buckner began working as a phone representative at Hallmark, then located in Aurora, in March 2008 and within months filed an insurance claim saying her young daughter died of an illness.
After receiving $10,000 and paid time off, Buckner filed a second claim saying she slipped in a puddle of water at work and was injured. One day before she was scheduled to go back to work from that incident, prosecutors said, she made a third claim that her FBI agent husband had been shot and killed in the line of duty in Chicago.
Bourgeois and Rivers, both former FBI agents in Chicago, said Buckner tried to back her claims by faking death certificates rife with misspellings and errors. One certificate referenced a doctor who had not lived in the area for 10 years, they said.
Upon further investigation, the former agents said, they learned Buckner had received $60,000 in 2007 after claiming her twin children and FBI agent husband died. They said she later took out insurance for three children and a husband when Hallmark hired her, allegedly while she was still on leave at HSBC.
“She’s incredibly believable,” said Bourgeois, who described Buckner as having a “sweet” and “soft-spoken” demeanor. “She’s just the typical con artist, and that’s what gets her in the door. She is good.”
Bourgeois said Buckner maintained her husband was gunned down as an FBI agent until the investigators explained their own backgrounds and that they would have heard about a fellow agent being killed.
“Then she says, ‘OK, maybe he wasn’t,’” Bourgeois recalled.
Rivers said investigators were unable to verify whether Buckner had children, but they find record of a man Buckner described as her estranged husband.
“She worked for us — worked — maybe three weeks,” Rivers said. “It was just outrageous.”
Buckner, who pleaded guilty in June, now is being sought by law enforcement in two counties.
Last week, she was indicted in Cook County on charges she used the stolen identities of 29 people across the country to rack up about $30,000 in debt. A no-bail arrest warrant also was issued in that case after she failed to appear in court.
Buckner’s DuPage case was continued to Sept. 7. Assistant State’s Attorney Helen Kapas said she will ask the judge to sentence Buckner even if she is absent.
Buckner’s attorney, Matthew Hachigian, told the judge he “has no notion where she is.”
“I wish I could tell you, judge,” he said in court Tuesday. “I have had no contact with her. Her mother has no idea.”