Jack Ward Fire Consultants is pleased to announce the launch of its newest division, the Special Investigations Unit. We are also pleased to welcome Keith Pearce, SIU Operations Manager to our family. After 22 years in the Special Investigations Unit (SIU) at State Farm Insurance, Keith has joined our team of highly trained investigators.
In 1969, Keith Pearce enlisted in the United States Army where he was assigned to the Army Security Agency as a Morse Code Interceptor. He served in Vietnam from 1970 to 1971 and in Taiwan from 1971 until receiving an honorable discharge in 1972. Upon completion of his army service, Keith enrolled at Santa Rosa Junior College in Northern California where he received an Associate in Arts Degree. He currently holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in History and Political Science from Sonoma State College.
While attending college in 1972, Keith became employed with State Farm Insurance Companies as a data processor. After graduating college in 1976 he went to work as a property and casualty adjuster with the firm of Crawford and Company, working in the Oakland, California area. After enhancing his skills as an adjuster, Keith was rehired with State Farm a short time later, also as a property and casualty adjuster. His tenure with the company continued into 1978, when he transferred to Florida and worked in the State Farm Panama City claims office. In 1986, and with over ten years as an adjuster, Keith was asked to join the State Farm Special Investigation Unit. Serving in the SIU until his retirement in 2012, Keith handled a multitude of multi-line insurance fraud claims and testified approximately thirty times in State and Federal courts on cases ranging from criminal arson claims to civil insurance fraud claims. Keith has instructed multiple times at seminars across the country including the International Association of Arson Investigators Annual Training Conference, Florida Advisory Committee on Arson Prevention Annual Seminar and the Florida Insurance Fraud Education Committee yearly training seminar. He has also been honored by his peers in receiving the 2011 SIU Investigator of the Year Award, which was presented to him by the Florida Insurance Fraud Education Committee.