A former U.S. Army financial counselor used his position to bilk two dozen dead service members’ families out of life insurance and other benefits by steering them to investments on which he was secretly reaping hefty commissions, federal prosecutors said Friday.
In addition to the criminal charges, Craffy faces a civil complaint filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission.The announcement of the charges against Craffy, a civilian Army employee from 2017 until this past January and a longtime member of the Army Reserve, came after a February article in The Washington Post detailed several families’ complaints about him.
The families’ descriptions to the Post of how Craffy, 41, of Colts Neck, New Jersey, depleted rather than preserved their life insurance and other payouts closely aligned with the scheme laid out by prosecutors in an indictment.Craffy’s job as financial counselor was to provide general financial education to veterans’ beneficiaries as a service the Army provides to help grieving families, the indictment says.
But prosecutors said Craffy did both, targeting Gold Star families, who are entitled to a $100,000 death gratuity and life insurance of up to $400,000. He used his access to military databases to identify and directly contact the families, even those he did not work with.