L&I Orders Man To Pay State $104,000

Thu., June 18, 1998

By Hannelore Sudermann hannelores@spokesman.com

The state of Washington wants its money back and more.

This week, the state Department of Labor and Industries ordered a Spokane man to repay nearly $70,000 and pay another $34,000 in fines for accepting workers compensation the state says he took illegally.

Keith Paulsen, 41, first claimed compensation for a trucking accident in Washington nearly four years ago. His claim, according to L&I, was that he was disabled and couldn’t operate a car or truck.

Starting in July 1994, L&I sent Paulsen monthly checks - and periodic reports to sign, assuring the state that he wasn’t working.

But a claims manager noted that Paulsen was seeing a psychiatrist in Montana when he was supposed to be living in Spokane. She asked for a check on his activities.

“That’s sort of a routine thing when they notice there is something odd in the claim,” said Steve Valandra, spokesman for L&I in Olympia.

Investigators discovered Paulsen had a job at a retirement center in Sidney, Mont., starting the month he got his first payment from L&I. Just over a year later, he had a second job managing a motel in Sheridan, Wyo., and finally a third job managing another motel in Montana, investigators said.

He received compensation payments from the state through March 17, 1997. His last check, for $2,188, brought the total paid to him to $69,131. The state wants that sum repaid, plus $34,565 in fines for workers compensation fraud, the maximum 50 percent penalty allowed under Washington law.

Paulsen could not be reached for comment Wednesday. His attorney in Bellingham declined to comment.

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