Tuesday, October 8, 2019

Jury Orders Bart Reagor to Pay Ford $53.7 Million


[[TICKET CONNECTION FOR NEWCOMERS:  Reagor-Dykes Auto Group ads, featuring folksy Bart Reagor, a man who never threw a touchdown pass like Tony Romo, but who could get you Any Car U Want, were ubiquitous on The Ticket for quite some time, before his empire went all completely to hell over the course of a few days in the summer of 2018.]]

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A Lubbock jury has found Bart Reagor personally liable to pay Ford Credit $53.7 million and change.

Image result for bart reagor
Bart Reagor, Radio Advertising Pioneer
This was not a finding that ol' Bart personally committed any fraud.  The chief culprit here is Reagor-Dykes's Chief Financial Officer at the time, Shane Andrew Smith.   Smith kited checks between multiple banks, and got Ford Credit loans for Reagor-Dykes based on dummy VIN numbers for cars not at the dealership, then used the cash to cover other expenses.  He could get up to 20 years in jail; I haven't been able to find any information on whether he has been sentenced.  Four of his staff have also pleaded guilty and taken deals.

Image result for shane smith reagor dykes
Shane Andrew Smith, Fraudster
Ol' Bart was not criminally charged, but was he aware?  We're talking about nine-figure liability (totaling up other claims) here.  When Ford Credit swooped in and audited the dealerships, Bart claimed this was the first he'd heard of it.  Reagor-Dykes fired Smith and referred the matter to the U.S. Attorney.  Was ol' Bart covering his ass, or doing what his lawyers told him he had damned well better do?  He was apparently pretty sure Smith would not implicate him, so maybe he was innocent of the fraud.  He hasn't been charged but has taken the fifth amendment under some questioning.

What he was not innocent of (along with Dykes, who settled earlier with Ford Credit) was signing a personal guaranty of Reagor-Dykes's indebtedness to Ford Credit.  Those things are pretty ironclad;  when the primary debtor (the dealership) doesn't pay, you gotta pay and I mean now and no backtalk, and there's almost nothing available to you as a defense, including that the default is someone else's fault (it frequently is).  In fact, 'ol Bart's argument was that the amount of money Ford claimed was much, much more than its actual losses.

The jury did not agree and awarded Ford every penny it sought.  The court had already ruled that the guaranty was valid -- this trial was more or less about where to put the decimal point.


Ol' Bart probably wishes he hadn't threatened to shoot the Ford Credit auditor who showed up to check his books.  (Ford Credit came back a couple of days later with the Ford corporate security team.)  No, he probably wishes he'd made nice and made a deal with Ford, which (as these things usually go) was probably available to him.   After all, the whole thing was more sordid than just a rogue executive screwing Ford Credit.  Rick Dykes has alleged that one of Smith's direct reports, one Pepper Rickman

Pepper Rickman, Enchantress

was having an affair with a Ford Credit guy. (https://www.kcbd.com/2019/03/21/rick-dykes-reveals-corruption-secrets-affairs-within-rdag-witness-statement/)   He said that Ms. Rickman was tipped off to audits in advance and alerted Smith, who moved things around to enable Reagor-Dykes to stave off the day of reckoning.

But no, ol' Bart got his back up and refused to pay, and now he's going to have a court order telling him yeah, you gotta.  I assume he'll appeal.

I'm thinking:  You know, he probably wasn't as nice a guy as he tried to make us think he was in all those ads.  I mean, it's possible.

I'm glad he didn't shoot Tony Romo.

Image result for bart reagor tony romo



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ThePlainsman1310@gmail.com
@Plainsman1310

15 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. Sure d@mn did.

      Plainsman, read the various articles at autonews.com over the last three weeks to get a deeper look into it all, including the guilty pleas from two Reagor-Dykes female employees (Office Manager and Comptroller) who committed bank fraud by being the ones actually kiting the checks.

      https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndtx/pr/two-reagor-dykes-employees-plead-guilty-bank-fraud-conspiracy

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  2. I, for one, appreciate all that P-Man did to summarize this, and for that matter all that he's done to his body.

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  3. Just heard an ad for Baby Dolls. And apparently the Chicas Locas ads are back in rotation. Wasn't there a time that ads for gentlemen's clubs only ran during the overnight programming?

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  4. I've read all those articles and many more. Just trying to boil it down for the Confessor.

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  5. And my boildown mentions the other employees guilty of the fraud, although their gender struck me as irrelevant.

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  6. "In fact, 'ol Bart's argument was that the amount of money Ford claimed was much, much less than its actual losses."

    I assume you meant "much, much more"?

    Anyway, when I was looking for a car back in 2017, I went to Bart's site because I knew exactly what I wanted: make, model, year, options, etc. I thought I could punch in my particulars--or talk to someone--and they'd say, "Okay, sir, we'll track down some options for you." I quickly determined that the site and business really weren't set up to do that at all, and that a broker or buyer would be in a much better position to help me.

    I just always thought it was weird to present your business as something when it was not really that thing. But I guess it got me to the site, and got Bart to many Beast Feasts.

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  7. David, thank you for the correction. You are correct. I will make the correction in the text.

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  8. The interview with the pool legends on Work in Progress this morning is absolutely fascinating. I should have written down the names of the two guys, but one of them is speaking movingly, although without emotion, of the decline of his skills and advancing age. The interview is probably not going the way Justin and David intended, but it's fascinating listening.

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  9. I have no particular brief for the Longhorns, and I am not a gigantic college football fan so it didn't break my heart that Texas lost. But please, one of you is going to have to tell me:

    Was that the most listless, unskilled, weak, just flat pathetic and sad exhibition of TACKLING in the history of the game?

    Were the Sooners' uniforms made of flubber?

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  10. The pool players being interviewed are: Earl Strickland and Skyler Woodward.

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  11. As an orangeblood, I will say the Horns lack of tackling was pretty sad. But confirmation from Corby will be more definitive.

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  12. Nothing like wanting to get the full Bob Sturm dissection of the Cowboys (Jason Garrett) humiliation against Jets only to be cut short by an exciting early season afternoon F'ing hockey game. I swear being the flagship station for the Stars is going to be the death of the Ticket.

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  13. I soooo wish they would get rid of the Stars! It wouldn't bother me if the Stars left Dallas altogether!

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  14. The idea of hockey on the radio is ridiculous on its face.

    ReplyDelete