In a wide-ranging scheme that prosecutors are calling “insurance farming,” a former manager for one of the larger agricultural operations in Florida is now awaiting a sentencing hearing in December.
Christopher Lee, 49, from the Naples area, on Aug. 26 pleaded guilty to more than $1.1 million in crop insurance fraud, part of a federal investigation that has led to six guilty pleas. More indictments are expected later this fall, and may include a local insurance agent.
“In or around 2021 or 2022, at the direction of, or with the knowledge of, Coconspirator 1, Lee began engaging in ‘insurance farming,'” a practice by which the farm would deliberately fail to fumigate and fertilize insured crops, all to gain crop insurance payments, reads the plea agreement.
The court documents did not name “Coconspirator 1” nor did they name the agriculture company Lee worked for. But multiple news sites in southwest Florida have reported that Lee previously was a manager for Oakes Farms, which has thousands of acres of farm operations in Collier and other counties. Lee also managed his own farm company, C Lee Farms and C Lee Pepper Farms, and acted as a “straw farmer” for his coconspirator, the plea agreement indicates.
Oakes Farms is owned by Francis “Alfie” Oakes III, a successful agri-businessman in the Naples area, well known for his political views. Oakes has not been named in court records or indictments. Federal agents in last 2024 raided his home and business locale in a separate investigation, according to local news reports.
In 2014, Oakes Farms businesses made headlines when they were raided by officers with the Florida Department of Financial Services. DFS alleged that the firms had hired undocumented or illegal immigrant workers and that some of the laborers had used fake identification in order to obtain workers’ compensation insurance, news sites reported. Alfie Oakes said at the time that his companies did not knowingly hire illegals.
More pleas may be on the way in the latest federal investigation. “Coconspirator 2” is an insurance agent who facilitated Lee’s crop insurance fraud, Lee’s plea agreement explains.
“Lee knew Coconspirator 2 to conspire with him and others in the Farm Organization with respect to their crop-insurance fraud,” prosecutors wrote. “This included, for example, Coconspirator 2 delaying filing acreage reports so that insured crops could not timely be inspected by crop-insurance adjusters, and Coconspirator 2 backdating documents, or notarizing false documents, to further the crop-insurance fraud.”
The agent also would make other offers to assist in the farm organization’s crop-insurance fraud, including offering to run interference with crop-insurance adjusters and offering to create fake spray logs, the agreement notes.
“From 2019 to November 2024, C Lee Farms and C Lee Pepper Farms received more than $1.9 million in crop insurance indemnities, the plea agreement says, noting the federal government also subsidized about $514,033 of C Lee Farms and C Lee Pepper Farms’ crop insurance premiums and paid their approved insurance providers about $194,730 in administrative and operating expenses,” the court document reads.
Lee also agreed to plead guilty to defrauding the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Coronavirus Food Assistance Program. He has agreed to pay full restitution and has already paid more than $700,000, his attorney told the Gulfshore Business news outlet.
Lee’s sentencing hearing is set for Dec. 1.
Topics Agencies Florida Agribusiness
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