Man charged with insurance fraud

www.morgancountycitizen.com, Patrick Yost, August 12, 2025

A Cumming man with property off Indian Creek Road has been arrested and charged with insurance fraud after investigators allegedly found a travel trailer he had reported stolen on his property.

According to Investigator Joseph Pritchett, Morgan County Sheriff’s Office, Benjamin Lee Studer, 44, was arrested at a Madison hotel 10 days after he filed a theft by taking report at the Morgan County Sheriff’s Office.

According to that report, filed on July 28, Studer alleged that a $100,000 Seismic 395 camper; a 2022 Massey 4710 tractor valued at $80,000 and a 2023 Rhino bush hog machine valued at $8,000 were all taken from the Indian Creek Road property. Pritchett alleged that a day after Studer filed the theft complaint, he also filed an insurance claim on the equipment.

A day after that, Pritchett said, investigators with the Morgan County Sheriff’s Office found the 40 foot camper on Studer’s property. “We went to the property to look for clues of the theft and found the camper,” he said.

Studer was arrested while at a Madison hotel on Aug. 7 without incident and was released on Aug. 8 on a $27,000 bond. He has been charged with felony insurance fraud, felony concealment of writings or facts and a misdemeanor charge of false report of a crime.

Neither the tractor nor the bush hog attachment has been located, Pritchett said.

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