Welcome back from your weekend, dear readers.  I know it’s a Monday, and Mondays can be tough.  So I bring to you a story of love – love that is unstoppable; love that is immortal; love that even the barrier of shuffling off this mortal coil cannot break.  I bring you the story of Rosa Maria Barajas.

Even after her husband passed away in May of 2010, she continued to receive his love in the form of workers’ compensation payments from New York Life.  However, mean, nasty New York Life decided to get in the way of this special relationship.

According to the press release, Mr. Barajas suffered an industrial injury in 1997 that left him legally brain-dead.  Ms. Barajas was appointed his legal guardian.

Reporting the strange occurrence to the California Department of Insurance, the DOI took a look at the situation, and noticed that Mr. Barajas was receiving over $18,000 per month in benefits… but he wasn’t alive to receive them.   Mrs. Barajas kept cashing the checks, and racked up over $576,000 (by your humble blogger’s calculations) from New York Life.

Well, Ms. Barajas has been arrested and bail has been set at $500,000 (where, oh where, would she get money for bail?)

New York Life might get some of its money back, but I’m sure they would have much rather stopped issuing payments as of May, 2010.  So let this be a lesson for all of us – a bit of diligence with making sure there is living person receiving the checks could save a fortune in the long run.