An insurance fraudster who pocketed more than £14,000 for the supposed theft of Lego sets, fishing gear and gaming consoles was behind one of last year’s most high-profile bogus claims.
Investigators uncovered £1.34bn of fraud in 2025, a 14% increase on the year before, according to the Association of British Insurers (ABI).
The Lego fraudster, Matthew Johnson, was sentenced to 28 months in prison last December after an investigation by the City of London police’s insurance fraud enforcement department.
Johnson, of Misterton in Nottinghamshire, submitted false claims to Axa Insurance between May 2021 and January 2022, relating to alleged burglaries at properties in Shetland and Goole, East Yorkshire.
He claimed that high-value items had been stolen, including MacBooks, televisions, gaming consoles, fishing equipment and large quantities of collectible Lego sets….
PAYROLL & HR CONTROLS (PREVENTING “GHOST” SCHEMES)
Payroll fraud is often the hardest to detect because it “looks” like a normal business expense.
- Segregation of Duties (SoD): The person who adds new employees to the system must not be the same person who approves the monthly pay run.
- Mandatory Vacation Policy: Require all financial and HR staff to take 5–10 consecutive days of leave annually. Fraud often surfaces when the perpetrator isn’t there to “hide” the trail.
- Ghost Employee Audit: Perform a quarterly “Headcount Reconciliation” where managers must physically verify every name on their payroll list exists.
- Self-Pay Blocking: Ensure the payroll software has a hard-coded block preventing administrators from editing their own salary or bank details.