Four Men Sentenced To Prison For Conspiracy For Rolling Back Car Odometers

NOTFEA

United States Attorney Jenny A. Durkan
Western District of Washington

Four Men Sentenced To Prison For Conspiracy For Rolling Back Car Odometers

Seventy-five Cars Sold with Falsified Mileage

Department of Justice Seal

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE March 2, 2012

Four men from Puyallup, Washington were sentenced today in U.S. District Court in Tacoma to prison terms for conspiracy to sell used cars after tampering with the odometers, announced U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan.   RICKY RISTICK, 23, and his father ROBERT “BOB” RISTICK, 42, conspired to roll back the odometers on 36 different automobiles.  RICKY RISTICK was sentenced to 18 months in prison and ROBERT RISTICK was sentenced to two years in prison.  MILLER STEVENS, 32, and his brother STANLEY STEVENS, 28, conspired to roll back the odometers on 39 different vehicles.  MILLER STEVENS and STANLEY STEVENS were each sentenced to two years in prison.  At sentencing U.S. District Judge Ronald B. Leighton said there was a significant safety problem created by the defendants’ crime.

The four men operated entities buying and selling cars under the names One Stop Auto and RSV Auto.   The RISTICKs are responsible for restitution for $144,000 in fraud losses.  The STEVENs are responsible for $156,000 in restitution for fraud losses.  According to records in the case, the men would purchase high mileage vehicles from both private sellers and used car dealers in Washington and Oregon.  The men would then have the odometers rolled back, so the new purchaser would think it was a low mileage vehicle.  The plea agreements describe examples of the scheme.  The RISTICKs admitted that in 2006, they bought a 2000 Chevrolet Silverado with 192,000 miles from a private seller in Oregon for $7,800.  In early 2007, they requested that an auto repair shop roll the odometer back to 64,521.  They then sold the Silverado to a car dealer in Wenatchee for $15,000.

In July 2006, MILLER STEVENS purchased a 2000 Toyota Tundra from a private party in Montesano for $12,400.  The truck had a reading of approximately 126,000 on the odometer.  STANLEY STEVENS took the vehicle to a Puyallup repair shop and requested that the odometer be reset to approximately 39,500.  The truck was resold in July 2006 to a private party in Tacoma for $15,000.  When the buyer discovered the fraud in August 2006, he demanded his money back.  The STEVENS then resold the vehicle to another unsuspecting buyer.

In asking for a significant sentence, prosecutors noted that the deceptive sales directly affected public safety.  “For example, one of the defendants’ victims told investigators that he bought a pickup with 68,900 miles on the odometer for his son to drive to school. The truck actually had more than 190,000 miles. According to the victim, the vehicle’s wheel fell off while his son was driving out of a parking lot and toward a highway. Had the incident occurred minutes later at high speed, the result could have been much more serious. The owner of a truck with 68,900 miles can reasonably expect that his wheels will not spontaneously detach…. Victims of odometer schemes do not simply lose money; they are led to drive vehicles that may be far less safe and reliable than they realize,” prosecutors wrote in their sentencing memo.

Odometer tampering remains an important consumer problem.  To avoid becoming a victim of odometer fraud, the following tips can help:

  1. Have a mechanic you trust check out the car and look for signs of wear and tear that are inconsistent with the mileage on the odometer.
  2. Look for loose screws or scratch marks around the dashboard. This may signal that a mechanical odometer which has been manipulated with tools.
  3. Also on mechanical odometers, check to make sure that the digits in the odometer are lined up straight — particularly the 10,000 digit.
  4. Test drive the car and see if the speedometer sticks.
  5. Check for service stickers inside the door or under the hood that may give the actual mileage.
  6. Look in the owner’s manual to see if maintenance was listed or if pages that might have shown high mileage were removed.
  7. Ask the dealer whether a computer warranty check has been run on the car.
  8. Use a commercially-available computer search program that checks for mileage alterations. Some car dealers will give you one of these for free if you ask for it.
  9. Ask to see the title documents and look to see if the mileage reading on the documents has been altered. If the title is brand new, see if there is a reasonable explanation for the new title.  Odometer tampering rings often obtain new titles to hide mileage alterations or the true history of ownership of the car.
  10. Look to see if the steering wheel was worn smooth. Look for other signs of excessive wear on the arm-rest, the floor mats, the pedals for the brakes and gas, and the area around the ignition. If these items were recently replaced, that could also indicate efforts to hide the car’s true use and mileage.
  11. Don’t assume that mileage is accurate just because the vehicle has an electronic odometer.  Electronic odometers can be manipulated with electronic tools.

The case was investigated by the Seattle Police Department, the Department of Transportation – National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and the Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI).

The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Jerrod Patterson and Trial Attorney Alan Phelps with the U.S. Department of Justice Consumer Protection Branch.

Posted by Gary Mitchell

Four Sentenced in Federal Court in Odometer Fraud – Craigslist Crime Ring

NOTFEA

Gary Mitchell

Four Sentenced in Federal Court in Odometer Fraud- Craigslist Crime Ring

  • Investigation conducted by USDOT-NHTSA, Seattle PD, IRS-CID, WA Dept. Licensing
  • Prosecution by USDOJ Consumer Protection Branch and United States Attorney Office-Seattle WA

Four Puyallup men Four Puyallup men Four Puyallup men Four Puyallup men

 

TACOMA — Four Puyallup men are headed to federal prison for their roles in a scheme to roll back odometers on cars and then sell them on Craigslist.

In federal court in Tacoma, prosecutors said the group lopped off an average of 95,000 miles on each car they sold and handed to unsuspecting buyers the keys to potentially dangerous vehicles.

Robert Ristick, Miller Stevens and Stanley Stevens were each sentenced to two years in prison Friday. Ricky Ristick was sentenced to 18 months in prison. All the men live in Puyallup and many of the vehicles were sold in that area.

Justice has been a long time in coming for many victims. Charging documents state the men rolled back the mileage on 75 cars but authorities believe the number actually involved hundreds, if not thousands, of cars and trucks.

Posted by Gart Mitchell

Raleigh man charged with selling vehicles with altered odometers

NOTFEA
Francis Marino

Francis Marino

RALEIGH, N.C. —

A Raleigh man has been arrested and charged with selling vehicles with altered odometers out of his home.

Officials with the NC Division of Motor Vehicles License and Theft Bureau say Francis Marimo had been under investigation for months after a customer reportedly purchased a 2005 Honda Odyssey through an ad on Craigslist. The victim later discovered that the vehicle mileage had been changed.

During the investigation, agents learned Marimo would travel to different states to purchase the vehicles, then return to Raleigh where he would allegedly change the odometer cluster and then place the vehicle on Craigslist for sale.

On Tuesday inspectors seized four Honda odometer clusters, $17,200 in cash, keys to different vehicles, motor vehicle titles, and paper work pertaining to the sale of vehicles.

Marimo was charged with two counts of odometer fraud, two counts of obtaining property by false pretenses, and one count of acting as a motor vehicle dealer without a license. He was placed in jail under a $3,000 secured bond.

Bureau officials say they continue to look into how long Marimo had been making such sales and says more charges are possible. Anyone who thinks they may have been a victim of the fraud is asked to call the Bureau at (919)816-9194, ext. 2.

Posted by Gary Mitchell

Thank you!

NOTFEA

Our 2011 Conference in Charleston, West Virginia was terrific! Conference attendees received hours of quality education in techniques, skills and case presentations to further their expertise in odometer and title fraud issues.

Stay tuned for information on our 2012, combined MOTFEA/NOTFEA Conference in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Be sure and save the date: June 3rd-7th, 2012! More information will be in the NOTFEA/MOTFEA Conference link as it becomes available.

Posted by Kirk Ballard

In loan case, jury awards Independence woman more than $1 million

NOTFEA

An Independence woman recently won a $1,198,512 court judgment, with jurors finding that a finance company had misled her into making car payments she wasn’t obligated legally to pay.

The case, her lawyers said, pointed to an abusive lending practice that cuts particularly deep during tough economic times.
Lawyer Bernard Brown, who represented the woman, said the Missouri Merchandising Practices Act protects consumers who are unable to obtain car titles when their dealers go out of business. The law views such sales as “fraudulent,” and purchasers are not required to keep making payments if they cannot obtain the titles, Brown said.

“Consumers don’t know that they don’t have to pay, and in fact are entitled to all their payments back and their credit cleaned up,” Brown said.
How many consumers get stuck with such cars after dealers go out of business is difficult to say, acknowledged Brown, whose law practice specializes in automotive issues. But Missouri Department of Revenue figures show a 9 percent decline in the number of car dealer licenses issued in Jackson County between 2006 and 2010.

The problems for Brown’s client, Carrie Peel, began in August 2008 after she purchased a 2005 Ford Taurus for $12,450 the previous month, paying $3,500 down and financing the rest. Her 30-day temporary license tag was expiring and she went to the Department of Revenue to license the car. Her dealer paperwork didn’t include the title, which she needed for the license. But she got a shock when she returned to the dealer.

“When I went back up there, they were closed for business,” Peel said recently. “I’m looking in the window, and they’ve closed.”
The dealership had, however, sold her installment contract to Credit Acceptance Corp., a Michigan lender that is one of its industry’s leaders.
In her suit, Peel contended that when she called Credit Acceptance officials to tell them that she never received the title, she was told that it was “not our problem.”

“I was told I had to pay on the car whether I had a title or not,” Peel said. If she didn’t, “they said it would reflect on my credit report,” she said.
The company did not return a call seeking comment.

Unwilling to take the credit hit if she defaulted and the finance company repossessed, Peel said she kept paying on an untitled car that quickly became more and more of a burden. She and her husband kept the expired temporary tag taped in the window and occasionally attached a license plate from another vehicle to avoid getting stopped.

But Peel was trapped in the vehicle, she said. Without a title, she couldn’t sell the car. She didn’t have the credit to buy another vehicle. And she was stopped by police officers for driving an unlicensed vehicle, an experience she found “embarrassing and humiliating.”
The couple kept the car insured, though they knew that trying to collect an accident claim on an unlicensed car probably would be difficult.
As the months progressed, Peel paid more than $7,200 to the finance company
State officials suggested that she try a lawsuit to get the title, but hiring a lawyer would cost at least $500 upfront, money that Peel said she didn’t have.

In January 2010, Peel lost her retail job and qualified for Legal Aid services. A lawyer there spotted the consumer law that should have protected her and filed suit.
Brown, who later joined the suit with colleague Dale Irwin, said they offered to settle the case for as little as $30,000, but the finance company pushed for a trial.

After a week in court, jurors voted Peel $11,007.81 in actual damages and more than $1.18 million in a punitive award.
Though the punitive award is handsome, it is likely to be trimmed to conform to a state cap of $500,000 for such damages, Brown said. And half of that will go into a state fund for tort victims.
Still, Peel said she felt vindicated by the jury’s decision and plans to speak out further on other consumer protection issues.
“I hate bullies,” Peel said. “They’re my pet peeve.”

http://www.kansascity.com/2011/12/31/3346986/in-loan-case-jury-awards-independence.html