700 crashes for cash

An elderly Manchester couple helped bring down a car insurance crime ring in 2010. Mr and Mrs Gallanders were on a roundabout in their Nissan Micra when a Lexus ploughed into the back of their car.

The driver not only blamed them for the collision but called the police, accusing them of racial abuse. The accident took place in 2007 and it took three years pursuing the case through the courts before justice was done.

Brothers Rezwan and Rehan Javed, the ringleaders of what turned out to be a major insurance scam, were convicted of conspiracy to defraud in 2010.

The brothers from Burnley, Lancashire, ran accident management company North West Claims Centre. It emerged that they had staged over 700 crashes to make fraudulent insurance claims worth an average of £17,000 each...