The pilot of a Beech Baron involved in a highly publicized ditching in the Gulf of Mexico in 2012 has been indicted for insurance fraud. Theodore Wright and two other men, Shane Gordon and Raymond Fosdick, have been charged with several counts as part of a larger investigation that also involved an old Citation, an exotic car and a boat. The Baron ditching garnered national headlines when Wright posted a video of himself bobbing around in the Gulf after the ditching. An edited version of the video, shown below, was turned into a promotion for the case protecting the iPad that he shot it with. He told authorities he was flying from Texas to Sarasota, Florida, and was forced to ditch by smoke and fire in the cockpit. The indictment, filed in Tyler, Texas, in May, alleges it was all about the insurance money.
The indictment says Wright bought the airplane for $46,000 and insured it for $85,000. He took a water landing course immediately before the ditching and was accompanied by Fosdick on the flight. According to the indictment, the associate allegedly sued Wright for injuries suffered in the mishap as a way of settling a debt Wright owed him. Wright’s insurance company paid an out-of-court settlement of $100,000. Wright and his accomplices are also alleged to have crashed a $76,000 Lamborghini (insured for $170,000) into a flooded ditch and setting fire to a $190,000 Citation (insured for $440,000) in deliberate acts of insurance fraud. They’re also alleged to have sunk a boat in Hawaii.
