No Plea Deal for Ex-Insurance Executive in Louisiana

Article

Terry Lisotta, who was indicted in late 2008 on 14 counts of theft by fraud from the Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance Corp., was unable to work out a plea deal with prosecutors Feb. 18.

Lisotta paced anxiously outside the courtroom as his attorney and attorneys from the state attorney general’s office tried to hammer out a deal.

“I came in to court this morning feeling there was going to be a trial,” said David Caldwell, an assistant attorney general for Louisiana. “We have always thought that there should be a trial.”

The deal breaker was the sentencing agreement, Caldwell said.

But Lisotta’s attorney, David Courcelle, said prosecutors’ insistence on some charges was the problem.

“Mr. Lisotta is not going to plead guilty to any crimes committed by other people,” Courcelle said.

Lisotta, the former chief executive of Louisiana Citizens, has pleaded not guilty to 14 counts of theft. He is accused of misusing about $30,000 in expenses from Citizens and two related insurance organizations – the Louisiana Automobile Insurance Plan, the state’s high-risk auto insurance pool; and the Property Insurance Association of Louisiana, the umbrella organization that ran the other two insurance groups until last year.

The charges against Lisotta came after the state legislative auditor’s office, in audits conducted from 2003 to 2006, alleged that Lisotta incurred more than $285,000 in questionable expenses, including lavish meals and trips, airline tickets and retirement gifts not related to Citizens’ operations.

The audits alleged that more than $106,500 of the expenses may never have been incurred or were not for business purposes.

If convicted on all 14 counts, Lisotta would face up to 140 years in jail, $42,000 in fines and restitution.

Trial is set for March 22.