MURDER FOR MONEY: Consent vs a dangling carrot — what must change to stop funeral policy killings?

Murder for Money schemes have appeared on the National Financial Ombudsman’s radar. She suggests that urgent changes need to be made in how insurance companies sell funeral policies to avoid putting unsuspecting victims’ lives at risk.

Last month, a high court judge was gobsmacked to learn that people were being killed by ruthless syndicates so they could profit from funeral policies which the victims were not even aware of.

This drew into question the entire life insurance industry and how easy it is for unsuspecting victims to become the target of organised criminals seeking to profit from their deaths.

But earlier this week, the National Financial Ombud Scheme (NFO) stepped forward and again raised this alarming question, and said urgent changes were needed within the life insurance industry to safeguard the lives of would-be victims.

The simple suggestion seemed like common sense: get consent from the person whose life is being insured.

While a legal expert in the thick of ongoing Murder for Money investigations acknowledges the NFO’s stance as a step in the right direction, he believes further changes are required where certain policy structures are “incentivising” criminals to commit these heinous crimes.

“Getting consent from the person whose life is being insured is certainly a step in the right direction. However, many of these policies offer double, or even triple, payouts [if] a person dies of unnatural causes. As long as these benefits remain in effect, the insurance companies are creating incentives that violent criminals simply cannot resist,” senior public prosecutor advocate Louis Sinclair said.

Last month, Sinclair returned to the Eastern Cape Division of the High Court in Gqeberha, where four accused are facing a laundry list of charges related to a suspected Murder for Money racket in which they allegedly profited by more than R1.7-million from fraudulent funeral policies.

Siyabulela Mbane, husband and wife Ntobeko and Xolelwa Msome and Unathi Peter face charges related to nine murders and 29 fraudulent funeral policies where they are accused of lying about being related to the deceased to profit from their deaths.

This is one of many cases under investigation by the police’s Murder for Money (MFM) task team, established in Nelson Mandela Bay because the metro and the broader Eastern Cape have become a hotbed for life insurance and funeral policy killings in South Africa.

These cases, the many victims they represent and the continuous attention the cases receive in the media, prompted the NFO to voice its strong stance against the status quo in the insurance industry.

“A murder-for-payout racket is rattling the insurance sector, and the Life Division of the NFO has sounded the alarm on these chilling cases surfacing in the media.

“At the same time, the NFO cautions that justice delayed must not become justice denied.