Donnie Callaway remains in custody Phoenix AZ. Grand Jury Indictment

Prosecution was trying to see what they could put together and they likely saw a very shaky case on top of this being white collar stuff with a bunch of exotic cars involved. People on a jury don't care about people who can afford or pay to have exotic cars worked on, no matter how absurd the billed amounts appear, they have nothing really to compare it to, it's all speculation. A person can bill whatever they want. Sucks because the law itself is all about and has grown from what brings the most money most of the time, and not necessarily what is 'right'.

 

We are also talking about Arizona, a state without very highly developed consumer protection laws unlike California. It remains to be seen if California cares to any degree about Donnies misdeeds. Your point about perception that this is a case of rich people rolling around biting each other is well made.

 

I thought the case was not about hourly rates and over-billing, but about theft, destruction of property, forgery, fraud, etc. These seem more black and white than "this jerk overcharged me" (which, I agree, would get zero sympathy from a jury).

I know very little about the case. But I had the impression that the evidence from the so-called sting was pretty cut and dry.

Does the fact that they were going back to a grand jury for another probable cause hearing imply that some of that evidence would have been inadmissible? Perhaps that's why the case fell apart - not because the evidence wasn't there, but because the prosecution couldn't use it?

What a travesty it would be if he was indeed guilty and has been set free on a technicality.

 

Attached is the complaint against Callaway by Arthur Teerlynck.
As bad as it may have seemed in the news articles, I assure you, it's orders of magnitude worse.
Thoughts?

 

The valuations are generous.

 

I been following this chat because I was affected by the arrest of Donnie Callaway since he was in the process of fixing my car. When I found out that Donnie Callaway was arrested, I was mad and worried about my car, I was able to get my car with the help of Trevor and take it to another shop recommended by a few members of the forum I also looked them up and had great reviews. Back then I thought I missed the red flags the cost of the work and the time frames, things taking to long. It seems Callaway was always traveling .

But now I’m very conflicted, I’m not here to say that he is innocent or guilty that is for the court to decide, but maybe my experience with Donnie was different. Yes I thought his pricing was high but now I’m paying even more, Donnie was upfront with quotes and work he was going to do and he send pictures of the progress of the jobs, Donnie was great about communicating and keep me updated. The new shop are horrible about communicating I have to text and email several times before I get a response, every time I ask for update I’m told they will get back to me. I have to beg for pictures and there quotes have been wrong and I get invoices with thing I did not agree for them to do and this is the “legit shop” or maybe I’m just unlucky but it does feel I was doing better with Donnie. Another thing that I found disturbing is my personal information posted on the forum without my consent also the fact that my phone number and email was given away again without my permission. Sorry for the rant but I needed to get that of my chest probably because I’m bitter about my situation.

 

I thought he didn’t have a valid auto repair license in the first place?

 

You are clearly still at the wrong place. I have said it 100 times and will again. This is the worst place in the world to get references.

 

He doesn't but that is of no consequence to Arizona authorities.
To me it is more a statement of how poor a job anyone did researching a shop. Its just too easy to check out. It also indicates he has no business insurance. No garage keepers liability company will touch an unlicensed facility.

 

Amen

 

have the charges been dropped or not? I see conflicting comments here.

 

I first met Donnie Calloway in 2004. I took my 1972 Dino to him for an evaluation of work needed after I purchased the car, to his shop way out north of LA. I lived about 21/2 hours away at the time . I left the car and came back two weeks later. The car was disassembled. Held my car for 3 years milking me for more and more money. I feel extremely lucky because I did finally get the car back in one piece. Of course after many threats.

 

And I am sure more $$$ then you like to think of.

 

Negative. It's going back to the Grand Jury to decide.

 

One thing I've learned is to get everything in writing as far as what work is being done, along with a reasonable timeline. A "well-respected" shop once billed me for thousands of dollars of work that I didn't approve. Even after they admitted as much, there was little to do except pay if I wanted to get my car back.

It doesn't help that some people seem to have great experiences while others get screwed at the very same shop.

Frankly, all of it has just pushed me to do more of my own servicing.

 

HERE is the issue.

By California LAW the shop owner is supposed to do that or the person getting the job done can avoid paying. Any changes to the estimate have to be written out and approved in writing. In CA the Bureau of Auto repair can remove a shop's license.

https://www.bar.ca.gov/

Someone cannot take their Honda to a shop for a tune up and end up with a $3000 bill without authorization. No different for a Ferrari. BAR does not care and to operate a legitimate auto repair business in CA, you need a license.

 

Where I live in Ontario Canada it is the same. Automobile repair shops and their techs must be licensed and must issue a written estimate that is approved by the customer. A deviation of 10% is allowed without approval but any more is not binding and the customer can take their car back so long as they pay the agreed to amount (plus 10% if needed). Seems like a fair way to do things even if it causes the whole process to have a little more red tape. It is generally my experience that most disagreements come from misunderstandings on one or both sides. Work orders with prices are a great way of avoiding such conflicts and anyone should be very wary of a shop that does not want to follow this practice.

 

In California, just like with a contractor, if a shop is unlicensed (Donnie) the bills are legally noncollectable.
But the current case is in Arizona so none of that applies.

 

Correct. Its two different "problems" Donnie faces. But by being non-licensed auto repair facility its completely possible an owner can take his car and pay nothing, especially if there is no paperwork at all. Donnie could sue to get his money.

I'm guessing he left the cars in a position where they were unrecoverable until he was paid.

Don might have been wanting to escape taxes. Who knows.....

 

There's a new instagram post. judging by his hashtags, he knows exactly what he's doing.....what a wanker.

sjd

 

I don't doubt he knows exactly what he is doing. The man is a sociopath.

 

We have been involved in the prosecution of a number of white collar crimes, trying to get the people that literately stole money from entities they were working with. In one case a guy stole more than $300k from various clients, and didn't even dispute it. He was stupid enough to put all the checks into a bank account, so the theft was easy to verify (he created an entity and bank account that was one letter off from the legitimate company name).

He ended up with serving the weekend in jail and restitution @ $45.00 per month.

The problem for the DA's office is that in the case I mentioned, and this case, there were hundreds, and perhaps thousands of transactions (his thefts ranged from $300-$800 at a time), which takes weeks of a jury trial, and if the DA is in a big city, they just don't have the staff to deal with it. In this case, the DA said that if he had not plead out, the DA would not have prosecuted the case.

Today he is working at an escrow company, handling client's funds again.

Same problem in this case, can you imagine how difficult it would be to get every witness on the stand and dissect each transaction over a multi-year period? Lots of communications which were probably verbal. How long would that trial be?

Even taking just 5 of the witnesses, how long do you think each would take to outline what happened and then prove it with canceled checks, credit card statements, billing, texts, and then trying to prove the repairs were not done - you would need to call experts in exotic car repairs to study every part of every claim.

Will all of the people that are wronged appear in court with a fully documented record - will they even spend the time to do so?

Then there is jurisdictional issues - can or should a DA prosecute a case from someone in another state?

By no means am I condoning his actions - just pointing out the difficulty in bringing these people to justice.

 

My thoughts are that you never spend $$ in attorney fees to sue someone that does not have assets, unless you are fighting on the principal of it, in which case your attorney can then go out new house shopping (or at least a new exotic).

 

Also, I don't think I would ever buy a car from Beverly Hills Car Club...especially if I lived in Belgium, and why would he keep going back to Callaway after the 1st bad experiance?

 

Wait, was Callaway related to BHCC? I didn't know that.