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Police: Elgin man fakes ‘slip and fall’ injuries

A 52-year-old man has been charged with insurance fraud after admitting to authorities that he filed a series of fake “slip and fall” lawsuits against fast food restaurants and grocery stores, according to Elgin police.

Juventino Guzman, of the 500 block of Prospect Street, Elgin, is charged with aggravated insurance fraud and three counts of insurance fraud of more than $100,000, according to court records.

An investigator from the National Insurance Crime Bureau contacted Elgin police last week about a suspected insurance fraud in which Guzmans’s attorney demanded $180,000 for injuries. Elgin police say they learned that Guzman, using an alias, filed a series of insurance claims for bogus “slip and fall” incidents in washrooms.

Guzman was arrested and charged on Monday after confessing to slip-and-fall scams at: Popeye’s Chicken, 1616 Big Timber Road, Elgin, in November 2011; Burger King, 7510 Kennedy Drive, Carpentersville, in April 2012; Butera, 3 Clock Tower Plaza, Elgin, in December 2012, police said.

Guzman “admitted to faking injuries which he claimed had occurred in the washrooms of the above named addresses. The defendant further advised that he faked these injuries with the intent of collecting money from false insurance claims,” according to an Elgin police report.

Guzman also said he was paid $219,000 in one case from an insurance claim made in April 2009, police said. Guzman, whose only other criminal offense in Kane County was an arrest for driving under the influence in August 1992 in Elgin, faces up to 15 years in prison on the insurance allegations. Probation also is an option.

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