Feds open wide-scale probe into state workers compensation claims

Federal investigators have opened a wide-scale criminal probe into the way state government compensates its injured workers, targeting three state arbitrators and a rash of claims at a downstate prison and in seven different state agencies. Federal prosecutors in Springfield and Fairview Heights in southwestern Illinois issued subpoenas in February seeking records on workers’ compensation claims filed since Jan. 1, 2006 by scores of government employees.