BY DAN HILDEBRAN
Monitor Editor
STARKE— A 65-year-old woman was arrested for fraud after state investigators said she applied for a critical illness insurance policy after she had been diagnosed for breast cancer.
Juanita Sanders Smith Profitt was arrested by Starke police on March 25.
According to a Florida Department of Financial Services sworn affidavit, the defendant represented on a March 9, 2021, $20,000 lump sum critical illness insurance application that she had not been diagnosed with cancer within the last two years.
She also represented that a “health care practitioner had not advised her to have an examination, diagnostic test, biopsy or consultation to determine or rule out the presence of cancer within the last five years.”
The following June, the defendant filed a claim on the policy and during the verification process, it was discovered that her first breast cancer diagnosis occurred one month prior to her insurance application.
In addition, the defendant had abnormal mammograms and a biopsy prior to applying for the insurance.
A Department of Financial Services investigator wrote that he met with the defendant in September 2021 about the application.
“She affirmed that she read the application, checked the boxes and signed the application,” wrote investigator David Morgan. “Profitt knowingly omitted information on the policy application that would have resulted in the policy not being issued.”
