Funeral Director’s Double Life Blows Up

Coffin with floral arrangements at a funeral service — Photo: Deman / Shutterstock

Disability insurance is built on self-reporting and trust; when a beneficiary lies about work and physical limits for years, the fraud does more than siphon money—it undermines a program designed to protect people at their most vulnerable.

The Short Version

A New Jersey funeral director, Steven D. Stankovits, was convicted of wire fraud and making false statements after years of concealing work and exaggerating limitations to keep Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) flowing.
Prosecutors documented physical work and international ski travel that contradicted his repeated claims of inability to work or perform basic tasks.
The case exemplifies the most common pattern in disability fraud: concealed work activity and false reporting over time, not a single dramatic act.
SSDI rules permit some work under strict reporting and earnings limits; fraud arises when beneficiaries lie about work or capacity to keep benefits coming.

What the evidence establishes: a long-running false-reporting scheme

The government’s case against Steven D. Stankovits was straightforward and specific. In 2010, he secured eligibility for Social Security Disability Insurance benefits, retroactive to 2007. Over nearly 15 years, he repeatedly represented to the Social Security Administration (SSA) that he was unable to work and could not perform routine activities—claims that, according to prosecutors and court records, were materially false. A federal jury convicted him of four counts of wire fraud and one count of making false statements; he was later sentenced to a year and a day in federal prison and ordered to pay restitution exceeding $585,000, the amount the SSA paid out based on his misrepresentations.

Two categories of evidence were decisive. First, prosecutors showed he was working as a licensed funeral director while drawing SSDI, engaging in duties incongruent with his sworn limitations. Those duties included moving heavy caskets, shoveling snow, and climbing a ladder to a roof—tasks that would be materially relevant to SSA’s assessment of functional capacity. Second, travel records and purchases documented ski trips to Cortina, Italy; Lake Tahoe; and Park City, Utah, along with a season pass at Killington, Vermont—again, activities incompatible with his claimed inability to sit comfortably, bend to dress, or engage in recreation he said he had given up. The indictment also pinpointed a Disability Update Report dated July 7, 2020, as a willful, materially false submission within the executive branch’s jurisdiction—an anchor for the false-statements charge.

How disability fraud actually happens: mechanism over myth

Most disability fraud is not faked wheelchairs or staged injuries; it is concealment. The SSDI program allows beneficiaries to work under tightly defined conditions—trial work periods, substantial gainful activity (SGA) thresholds, and reporting obligations. Fraud typically begins when a beneficiary exceeds those limits or experiences material medical improvement but fails to update SSA, then doubles down with false statements to keep payments coming. Inspector General testimony to Congress has long emphasized that the dominant error pattern involves beneficiaries failing to report work activity, not initial misdiagnosis or administrative fantasy—roughly two-thirds of improper SGA payments in one multi-year review stemmed from unreported work by beneficiaries.

That context matters for fairness: “working while on disability” is not inherently fraudulent. The line is crossed when claimants lie or omit material facts about employment and capacity—precisely what the jury found here. The DOJ’s narrative and the indictment place Stankovits squarely in the classic pattern: knowingly false capacity claims, concealed employment, and continued reaffirmations of those falsehoods across years of SSA contact.

Why the jury’s verdict is decisive in this case

In adversarial matters, courts are where contested facts are tested. Here, the record reflects a conviction by a federal jury after prosecutors demonstrated that Stankovits’s statements were materially false and that he used interstate wires to perpetuate the scheme—wire fraud’s core elements. The government’s account is unusually granular: it details not only work duties and travel but the specific representations he made about his limitations—unable to sit for more than 15 minutes, unable to bend to dress, struggling to lift a carton of milk, and having given up skiing—followed by proof that he did all the above and then some. While defendants need not speak publicly, no substantive defense-side public narrative contradicted these particulars in the available record; the verdict resolves the factual dispute.

Sentencing outcomes in disability fraud vary with loss amounts, personal history, and acceptance of responsibility. A year-and-a-day term may look lenient beside the headline dollar figure, but it is consistent with comparable federal cases where nonviolent first-time offenders receive custodial sentences calibrated by guidelines and restitution orders that claw back improper payments. The goal in program-integrity cases is not maximum incarceration; it is deterrence, recovery, and a clear signal that lying to maintain benefits will be punished.

Inside the program rules: what honest beneficiaries need to know

The SSDI system contains several work incentives designed to encourage beneficiaries to test their capacity without instant loss of support. Trial Work Period months permit earnings above a set threshold for up to nine months, followed by an Extended Period of Eligibility during which benefits can restart if earnings fall below SGA. Throughout, timely reporting is non-negotiable: work activity, improvements in medical condition, and changes in daily function must be disclosed. When people violate those duties—by failing to report or, worse, by affirmatively lying—overpayments accrue and, if intent is proven, criminal exposure follows. SSA and the Department of Justice have made clear for years that Title II program fraud can be charged under both specific Social Security fraud provisions and general federal statutes like wire fraud, with restitution, fines, and imprisonment on the table.

This architecture reflects a balance. The program must be flexible enough to allow recovery and return to work, yet firm enough to protect its integrity. The Stankovits case shows how investigators knit together employment records, travel and purchase data, surveillance or witness testimony about physical tasks, and the SSA’s own forms to establish material misrepresentation. Once that evidentiary mosaic is assembled, the defense faces a steep climb to square sworn limitations with documented conduct.

A Matawan, New Jersey, funeral director was convicted in a Social Security disability fraud case after investigators found he continued working while receiving benefits. Reports say he lifted caskets weighing about 160 pounds and traveled internationally to ski, including in the…

— Cool X Media Group (@teslamillion) September 24, 2026

What this means for program integrity and public trust

Every high-profile fraud case risks distorting public perception, implying that disability rolls are rife with deception. The evidence suggests something more nuanced. The SSA Office of Inspector General has reported that fraud investigations constitute a large share of its workload and that unreported work drives many improper payments, but that is not the same as saying most beneficiaries are malingering; rather, it indicates where enforcement yields is highest and where education and auditing should focus.

Still, sustained, willful falsehoods corrode confidence—and confidence is a hidden asset of social insurance. When the public believes the system credibly distinguishes between need and deceit, it supports funding and protection of benefits for genuine claimants. That is why prosecutors emphasize deterrence narratives alongside restitution in resolutions like this one. The lesson for beneficiaries is not to fear work; it is to respect the reporting rules and the truth. The lesson for administrators is to keep investing in modernized wage-matching, targeted reviews, and clear communication so that mistakes are corrected early—before they harden into felonies.