Bennett family facing fraud charges

Bill Gang

Thursday, April 8, 1999 | 11:03 a.m.

Federal authorities have expanded the criminal case against Arthur Bennett -- who already is alleged to have committed a fiery murder to fake his own death -- to include four family members.

In addition to Bennett, the federal indictment returned Wednesday names his mother, two brothers and his ex-wife on a charge of conspiracy to defraud the United States out of more than $300,000 in death benefits.

But the indictment goes beyond the charges of a financial scam to include allegations that the defendants actually participated in the plot to fake Bennett's death to avoid pending court-martial proceedings at his Marine Corps base in Yuma, Ariz.

The conspiracy is alleged to have begun in August 1993.

A day before Bennett's travel trailer exploded at a Lake Mead campsite on Feb. 3, 1994, killing a still unidentified man inside, he is alleged to have met with the four other defendants at his mother's apartment to discuss their roles.

Not named as a defendant in the indictment but liberally mentioned was Bennett's sister, Linda Walker, whose Lima, Ohio, home is said to have been the initial destination for the embattled Marine sergeant.

At the time, Bennett, 45, was facing military charges of sexual misconduct involving girls in Yuma and Okinawa and other sexual misconduct and spousal abuse charges involving his wife.

The indictment states that the day after the explosion, "Arthur Bennett telephoned Linda Walker in Lima, Ohio, and advised her, 'It's done. I'm on my way.' "

Two days later Walker was in Las Vegas with the other family members -- including Bennett's three children -- to attend funeral services for the man who wasn't dead.

Before the military funeral, the indictment states, Walker had told the defendants that Bennett was alive and staying at her Ohio home.

On Feb. 15, 1994, Bennett's former wife, Amelia Bennett, applied for Social Security survivors benefits in Yucca Valley, Calif., on behalf of the couple's three daughters. The next day she applied for dependency compensation through Veterans Affairs, the indictment charges.

On Feb. 18, 1994, Bennett's mother, Ellen Bennett, applied for her son's life insurance and received a check for more than $200,000 three months later.

According to the indictment, Walker distributed more than $11,000 total to two brothers, Scott and David Bennett, and more than $12,000 to a person named Bruce Bennett.

In June 1994, Amelia Bennett began receiving the first of the $2,000 monthly checks from Social Security, and the next month the $500 monthly military compensation for dependents began arriving.

The indictment charges the defendants used "deceit, craft, trickery and means that are dishonest" to procure the death benefits.

Bennett stayed in Ohio until December 1994 when he returned to Las Vegas -- utilizing false identification in the name of Joseph Benson -- and was reunited with Amelia Bennett and their three children.

They moved to Hurricane, Utah, and lived an idyllic life -- ostensibly on the death benefits and insurance proceeds -- until 1997. That was when he was arrested on sexual assault charges, and his real identify surfaced.