DES MOINES, Iowa- An Orient, Iowa man convicted of crop insurance fraud has been sentenced to three years of supervised release, with four months of house arrest in addition to paying over $40,000 in fines.
Carl Jeffrey Campbell, 71, of Orient, Iowa was sentenced on November 16, 2018. Campbell pleaded guilty to the offense on July 6, 2018.
According to the DOJ, in 2014, Campbell obtained crop insurance for two farms from an insurance company that was insured by the Federal Crop Insurance Corporation, which is a government corporation.
“The Federal Crop Insurance Corporation reimburses insurance companies for the payments made to policyholders under the Federal Reinsured Crop Program”
The DOJ says, Campbell, “crop shifted”. Crop shifting occurs when a farmer underreports production in one field in order to reach the percentage of loss required to receive an insurance payout from their crop insurance policy.
Campbell “shifted” production from one farm he owned to another by reporting that several thousand bushels of grain were harvested from one farm when he knew that those bushels were actually harvested from his other farm.
According to the DOJ Campbell also hid production by not reporting to the USDA or Federal Crop Insurance Corporation several thousand bushels of corn sold in his son’s name. He then received insurance payments fraudulently.
As a result, Campbell has been sentenced to:
“Three years of supervised release, with four months of home confinement for making a false statement in connection with federal crop insurance. Campbell was ordered to pay a $5,000 fine, $100 to the Crime Victims’ Fund, and $32,440 to the United States Department of Agriculture (“USDA”) as restitution. Campbell was also ordered to serve 160 hours of community service.”
