Queens Staged-Crash Ring Sentenced After Viral Dash-Cam Video Triggers Investigation

Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz and Governor Kathy Hochul announced Thursday that 53-year-old Jaime Huiracocha and 34-year-old Victor Murillo pleaded guilty to orchestrating a scheme that staged at least three motor-vehicle collisions on New York highways in 2024. The men recruited passengers, used borrowed vehicles, and deliberately caused rear-end crashes to file fraudulent personal-injury claims. Huiracocha received a sentence of one to three years in jail; Murillo was sentenced to two years. Prosecutors said the operation generated roughly $80,000 in insurance payouts.

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Staged-collision fraud has become a growing problem in New York. Governor Hochul noted that in 2023 the state recorded 1,700 staged crashes, the second-highest total nationwide, and that fraud-related reports rose 80 percent over five years. The surge has contributed to higher auto-insurance premiums for New York drivers, who now pay more than $4,000 annually—about $1,500 above the national average.

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• Crashes staged: three incidents between August and October 2024 (two on the Belt Parkway, one on the Nassau Expressway).

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• Financial gain: approximately $80,000 in personal-injury payouts.

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• Statewide trend: 1,700 staged crashes in 2023; an 80 percent increase in suspicious insurance reports over the past five years.

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Katz emphasized that the investigation uncovered an “ecosystem” of participants who profit from fake injuries. Governor Hochul linked the case to her administration’s push to lower insurance costs, citing the creation of a new cross-agency task force and a rebuilt insurance-fraud bureau.

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• “We started investigating the viral video and then backed up into these other two that we found out were the same players,” — Melinda Katz, claims district attorney

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• “We’re here to talk about the entire ecosystem of people who profit from these staged accidents. They are attorneys who help them with the insurance companies. They are the people in the medical field who are supposed to have been seen. They are individuals who faked their injuries. It’s an entire ecosystem of profit that they are making here, and we are going to investigate this type of behavior,” — Melinda Katz, claims district attorney

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• “Families are under a lot of stress, and for them to know that part of this is driven by criminal activity that they have nothing to do with, and they’re paying the price.” — Gov. Kathy Hochul

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State officials say the newly formed task force will coordinate among the Attorney General’s office, the Department of Financial Services, and local law-enforcement agencies to identify and dismantle additional fraud networks. The rebuilt insurance-fraud bureau is slated to expand its investigative capacity, though no specific timeline for further prosecutions was provided.

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