Los Angeles:
On Feb. 8, 2010, former City of Los Angeles employee, 51-year-old Olga
Zavala-Edwards, was convicted of workers’ compensation and insurance
fraud related to charges of filing a false claim for compensation.
Zavala-Edwards, who was a 24-year employee of the Los Angeles Police
Department (LAPD), was a civilian assigned to the Department’s Jail
Division as a supervisory detention officer. She was discharged from
her job on August 3, 2009.
LAPD investigators from the Workers’ Compensation Fraud Coordination
Unit, Special Operations Division, began investigating Zavala-Edwards
workers’ compensation claim involving an alleged industrial/on-the-job
injury shortly after the claim was submitted. The investigation
centered on how the alleged Nov. 2, 2008, injury occurred, the actual
location where Zavala-Edwards claimed she was injured and what
information she had given to her treating physicians. The
investigation was conducted in partnership with the Los Angeles County
District Attorney’s Healthcare Fraud Division, Workers’ Compensation
Division of the City’s Personnel Department and the Los Angeles City
Attorney’s Office.
The investigation revealed that Zavala-Edwards did not tell the LAPD,
her doctors or investigators with the City Attorney’s Office that her
injury actually occurred at her home before she reported to work on
Nov. 2.
As part of the criminal conviction for workers’ compensation fraud, the
court ordered Zavala-Edwards to pay full restitution to the City of Los
Angeles in the amount of $7,654.71 for all salary and medical benefits
the City paid as part of her fraudulent claim. In addition,
Zavala-Edwards was sentenced to 100 hours of community service and
placed on two years of summary probation.