The owner of a Pennsylvania insurance agency has pleaded guilty to scamming clients out of $97,000.
Thomas Harbaugh, 60, is a former local politician and president and owner of insurance agency Miller & Cornell, according to local news affiliate WMFZ-TV. He pleaded guilty Friday to insurance fraud and made full restitution.
Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro said that Harbaugh altered insurance policies and inflated premiums to make it look like clients had more coverage than they’d actually secured.
“This defendant – who served on Hatboro Borough Council and the boards of the Hatboro Chamber of Commerce and a local bank – betrayed his clients, sacrificed his ethics and broke the law,” Shapiro said.
Harbaugh was sentenced to six months of house arrest and more than six years of supervised release. In addition to restitution, he was ordered to pay a civil penalty of $5,000. He was also barred from acting as an insurance agent or from being employed “in any fiduciary capacity.”
