Fired automobile salesman constructed home of playing cards, police say

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A automobile salesman fired for siphoning tens of hundreds of {dollars} from a Detroit-area Stellantis dealership is accused of ripping off dozens of his former clients by pretending that he nonetheless labored for the shop.

Ricardo Perez, 38, was terminated by Dick Scott Chrysler-Dodge-Jeep-Ram in Plymouth, Mich., final July after managers found he had defrauded the shop.

Police stated Perez then started contacting his previous clients and providing them enticing offers for trade-ins and automobile leases, with out telling them he had been fired. He would meet with victims in parking heaps to conduct offers, convincing them the open-air assembly was to guard towards COVID-19.

Victims would give him their autos, considering they have been returning it to the dealership, and Perez would promote it himself. He stored some autos as a “rental” to make use of whereas scamming others, stated Ray Watters, the police chief in Lincoln Park, Mich., the place Perez was arrested this month.

“More often than not, he would take their down funds, a heavy down fee, and inform them there was no fee wanted for 3 months when in truth there have been funds wanted immediately,” Watters instructed Crain’s Detroit Enterprise, a sibling publication of Automotive Information. “What they thought was like a $500 a month fee on their truck was really nearer to $800, and the automobile they traded in was by no means traded in. So, then they discover out, not solely are they three months behind on their new truck, however they’re additionally behind on funds for the automobile they thought they turned in.”

Perez would even go to dealerships and signal leases on behalf of victims, police stated.

“Sooner or later,” Watters stated, “he will need to have been a good salesman as a result of he had fairly a following.”

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