A family of scammers pocketed $6million by staging car crashes using a sick urine trick and making themselves bloodied beforehand.
William Oldham Mize, or Uncle Bill as he is known as, from Spokane Washington was the self-proclaimed mastermind behind his family’s life of crime.
New York Magazine spoke with Ryan Park, Mize’s nephew, and Angela, his daughter, and reported on criminal court documents about the elaborate plots that they got sucked into.
Mize, 61, would only work with people close to him as he thought including strangers would lead to too much uncertainty.
For one of Mize’s insurance scams to work, the fake car crash had to look convincing and would lead to real injuries.
He would usually place the fake victims in their cars, take his briefcase of tools and reach in through the windows so that the blood spatters looked real.
He would cut people with razor blades and scuff up their wounds with sandpaper to make it look more believable, the outlet alleges.
Mize would give his accomplices concussions by hitting them with a liquor bottle or a frying pan.
Ryan said that Mize once made him chip his tooth with a pair of pliers, so he could later tell officials that he’d smashed it on a bottle during the crash.
Then the battered actors would get into a car and Mize would get into another car and hit the actors at 40mph or 50mph, the outlet reported.
Once he made impact, Mize would leave the car and hop into a getaway car, while another actor climbed into the driver’s seat to act as the at-fault driver.
Angela recalled one crash, where she swapped with her father and entered the driver’s seat.
She watched Mize crash her Sebring into a Mercedes.
Mize escaped in another car, leaving Angela in the wreckage, among the smoke, chemicals, and road dust billowing from the crash.
When the police showed up, Angela said: “How could I have done this?” and asked about the fake victims.
To Angela’s surprise, the cops willingly believed the scam.
It would happen at night with no cameras to catch them in their act before the cops would come.
SICK URINE TRICK
The “victims” would even spill a bottle of their own urine on themselves, so it looked like they blacked out.
Once the paramedics took the actors to the hospital, they would repeat their made-up stories that Mize had them rehearse prior.
They would tell hospital staff that they were covered by insurance, but didn’t have their member cards on them.
Weeks later, the fake victims asked for an itemized bill and asked to pay at a cash-discount rate.
Mize would then act as the victims’ representative under a fake name.
He would negotiate a settlement with the at-fault insurance company, the outlet said.
Sometimes, Mize would go as far as to fake the itemized bills to show even higher costs.
Mize averaged six staged accidents a year and made more than $6million.
Mize would pocket half the profits off of a scam and then once expenses like travel, celebrations, and even office supplies were calculated, Mize would give the rest of the actors their net profit.
FAMILY OF CRIMINALS
Other members of his family would join in on the scams that took place in Spokane and Las Vegas like his partner Sandi, his son Will V, and Ryan’s girlfriend Kimberly Boito.
Ryan said “I was basically his minion” and that it was “like a cult.”
Mize would find people when they were desperate for money, his family members said.
“Business, I hated. Family, I loved,” Ryan said.
“I couldn’t say goodbye to one side of it without saying goodbye to the other.”
In 2018, the FBI raided Mize and Ryan’s houses.
Twenty-two co-conspirators were charged for carrying out 33 staged car crashes since 2013.
The scams go beyond five years, with the first one recorded in 2006 by the outlet, but since their is a five-year statue of limitations, the government couldn’t charge them of all of their crimes.
Mize then went on the run and became a fugitive in 2019.
Ryan, Kimmy, Angela, Sandi, and Ron Wells, Mize’s friend who was a part of the scheme, all took plea deals and everyone but Sandi, who is serving nearly six years, are already out of prison.
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