Spring Valley Plumber ordered to pay $ 1 million for workers’ fraud

A plumbing entrepreneur based in Spring Valley was sentenced on Wednesday to pay $ 1 million on restitution after pleading guilty to fraud for accident accidents, prosecutors said.

Daniela Birdwell, owner of GPS Plumbing, pleaded guilty to fraud at the insurance premium against accidents at work as part of a scam she ran for several years, said the office of the district prosecutor.

San Diego Superior Court Judge Dwayne Moring ordered Birdwell to pay $ 10,000 a month until the restitution resolution, officials said. She was also sentenced to two years of official probation and 320 hours of community service.

“Employers who engage in premium fraud do not only experience the law, but they also benefit from an unfair advantage over their competitors,” said district prosecutor Summer Stephan in a statement.

Birdwell did not immediately respond to a comment request on Wednesday.

Prosecutors said Birdwell used an insurer named State Fund to provide labor accident insurance coverage from June 2016 to May 2021. Fraud was noticed for the first time when the insurer’s survey unit noticed a difference between the salary that Birdwell declared in the Department of Employment Development and Wages reported to the State Fund for five years.

The investigators of the company carried out an audit and discovered millions of dollars in undeclared salary, prosecutors said. The investigation was then given to the district prosecutor’s office and the Ministry of Insurance.

Officials said insurance fraud costs California $ 15 billion a year.

Originally published: April 2, 2025 at 4:24 p.m.