Roofing Company Head Admits Insurance Fraud

The head of a Wall Township roofing firm can expect to spend 180 days in jail for insurance fraud.

Charles Kelcy Pegler, Sr., president of Roof Diagnostics, Inc., admitted skipping hundreds of thousands of dollars owed to the company's workmen's compensation carrier.

The Spring Lake 56-year-old pleaded guilty to a third-degree charge of insurance fraud in a Monmouth County courtroom, according to information from the office of acting New Jersey Attorney General John J. Hoffman. He had been indicted last December.

Prosecutors are recommending the term in exchange for his confession. Pegler would also be given five years' probation and has paid $134,087 in restitution to Atain Insurance Company, authorities said. Sentencing is scheduled for June 6.

Pegler admitted that from June 11, 2003 to October 5, 2009, when his firm was based in Spring Lake Heights, he conned New Jersey Casualty Insurance Company that RDI was not a roofing company and employed no one for the installation, maintenance or repair of roofs, authorities said.

A probe by New Jersey's Office of Insurance Fraud revelaed that the insuror was short-changed by $265,044, officials said.

Pegler also confessed to a similar scam involving Atain, formerly USF Insurance Company between January 15 and December 9, 2009, claiming that all roof work was subcontracted. Investigators said the ruse allowed him to skip $134,087 in premiums.