Two Reagor Dykes Employees Plead Guilty to Wire Fraud Conspiracy, 11 Pleas Total |
|---|
Topics: Reagor Dykes Auto Group
|
U.S. Attorney’s Office, Northern District of Texas
11 December 2019
Two Reagor Dykes Auto Group employees pleaded guilty this week to participating in the auto group’s floor plan fraud scheme, following an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Dallas Field Office, announced U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Erin Nealy Cox.
Elaina Marie Cabral, a 30-year-old Reagor Dykes office manager who worked at RDAG’s Toyota store in Plainview, and Whitney Erin Maldonado, a 44-year-old Reagor Dykes office manager who worked at RDAG’s Mitsubishi store in Lubbock, pleaded guilty Wednesday to conspiracy to commit wire fraud before Magistrate Judge Lee Ann Reno in Amarillo.
Their colleague, executive assistant to the CEO Ashely Nicole Dunn, 34, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bank fraud in a related Reagor Dykes check kiting scheme last Wednesday.
They are three of eleven employees who have confirmed their roles in the $50 million Reagor Dykes scam. Admitted coconspirators include Reagor Dykes Chief Financial Officer Shane Andrew Smith and employees Sheila Miller, Lindsay Williams, Diana Urias, Paige Johnston, Pepper Rickman, Sherri Wood, and Brad Fansler.
In plea papers, Ms. Cabral and Ms. Maldonado admitted the company engaged in a practice they called “dummy flooring.”
Employees routinely dug through records for vehicle identification numbers (VIN) of cars Reagor Dykes had already sold, then submitted new loan applications to Ford Motor Credit Company using the old VINs – falsely indicating that the company was seeking a loan in order to repurchase the vehicle for resale, the pair admitted. After acquiring the new floor plan funding, instead of re-buying the car, Reagor Dykes used the ensuing loan to cover other expenses.
Ms. Dunn admitted in her plea papers that Reagor Dykes also engaged in systematic check kiting, a ploy that involves concealing fraud by cross-depositing checks across several banks.
Ms. Cabral and Ms. Maldonado each face up to five years in federal prison and may be required to pay approximately $27 million in restitution. Ms. Dunn also faces up to five years in prison and may be required to pay approximately $23 million in restitution.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation and Internal Revenue Service - Criminal Investigation Division conducted the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Joshua Frausto, Jeffrey Haag, and Sean Taylor are prosecuting the case.