Alabama Jury Deliberates Fate of Former Insurance Exec Goff

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Prosecutors told a federal jury Friday that Montgomery insurance executive John Goff stole millions to finance a lavish lifestyle.

Defense attorneys said Goff was indicted for what was simply a business dispute with two subsidiaries of XL America Corp.

The closing arguments Friday came at the end of a two-week trial. Jury deliberations were scheduled to begin late Friday.

A federal grand jury indicted Goff in April 2008 on 26 counts of mail fraud, conspiracy and embezzlement. Federal prosecutors accused him of fraudulently collecting workers’ compensation insurance premiums for two subsidiaries of XL America and not sending the company $4.5 million in premiums. They also accused him of lying to the state Department of Insurance about his company’s background.

Goff’s company, the Goff Group, was once a major provider of workers’ compensation insurance to businesses in the Southeast. His company had more than 200 employees in a large office building in Montgomery. The company sold policies for Greenwich Insurance Co. and XL Specialty Insurance of Stamford, Conn.

In closing arguments Friday, prosecutor J.B. Perrine said Goff was not passing along premiums to the two companies so that he could afford a lavish lifestyle that included a beach home, private plane and two country club memberships.

He said Goff cheated on insurance policies that businesses buy to cover their employees in case of an injury on the job.

“This man perpetrated the worst kind of scam,” he said.

Defense attorney Milton Davis said prosecutors never conducted an independent audit of Goff’s financial records. He said they would have seen that Goff was having a business dispute with XL America about payments, and the company decided to force him out of business. That would allow XL America to keep the insurance customers in the Southeast without paying commissions to Goff, Davis said.

“XL wanted to destroy somebody and that’s why we are here,” he said.