JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Jose Lantigua, the prominent business owner convicted of fraud after he faked his own death to collect millions of dollars in life insurance settlements, wrote a letter asking a federal judge to reconsider the 14-year sentence.
In “My Crime, The Short Story,” Lantigua filled 48 pages telling Judge Timothy Corrigan about his life that led up to the events that became one of Jacksonville’s highest-profile fraud cases.
Lantigua was an former Army Ranger who went on to management jobs at insurance companies and worked with NASA before buying Circle K Furniture in Jacksonville.
He claimed he made some bad business deals that left the furniture company millions of dollars in debt. He said he didn’t want his family to lose everything.
Lantigua wrote that he attempted to kill himself, but wanted his family to get his life insurance. So he met with a friend – a neurologist – who suggested he “disappear” and fake his own death.
He claims that doctor, whom we’re not naming because he hasn’t been charged, planted the seed and offered to fake a deadly illness.
In his letters, he begged Corrigan for mercy for what he called “a terrible, horrible mistake.”
"This is the type of case where it is going to be very difficult to believe what he had to say, based on the allegations that have been made," said attorney Gene Nichols, who is not affiliated with Lantigua's case.
Lantigua's wife, Daphne Simpson, who admitted to helping Lantigua with the scheme, is serving five years of probation.
The two claimed Lantigua had mad cow disease and needed experimental treatment in another country. They sought $5 million in donations, pitching their cause to nonprofits like the Tim Tebow Foundation. Those groups didn’t bite, but Lantigua went on with the plan, even convincing his wife.
"He said he had six months, thereabouts, to live," Simpson told News4Jax in May.
He found his way to Venezuela, telling his family he was getting treatment there. But he now admits that he later told Simpson he wasn’t sick, but was a rogue CIA agent, and drug cartels were set to kill him and his family. She said she believed him.
"Why would I think that he would lie about something like that?" she said. "I mean, it's sick."
In his letter, Lantigua detail trips Simpson made to visit him in Venezuela. They went sailing, "Seeing the sights, traveling … and enjoying each other’s company.”
Lantigua eventually got a doctor to fake his death and a mortuary to pretend that it cremated his body. Simpson went to the U.S. Embassy and signed off that her husband was dead.
Simpson started to collect on his life insurance policies, receiving $830,000 before investigators caught on to his scheme.
Lantigua moved to Simpson's mountain house in North Carolina under a new identity. Eventually, federal agents caught on and arrested them both.
Lantigua told Corrigan that while locked up, he became a true Christian and begged the judge to forgive his wrongs. He also asking to be released in August 2018 so he can attend his son’s wedding.
His requested was denied.
Lantigua’s criminal case may be closed, but he still faces is several open lawsuits.