Suspicion Leads to Arrest

Jack Maxton Chevrolet understands the Red Flags rule. Careful review of an applicants license, signature and loan application led to the arrest of an identity thief as reported in the Dealers Edge.

Something didn’t seem right about the customer looking for a car loan.

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Reggie Carter aka Jerry Stevens wanted a new Corvette in the worst way. Instead of the Corvette, however, all he got was a good lesson and some quiet time alone to think about what he had done.

The lesson: Dead men tell no tales. They also don’t buy new cars.

Reggie Carter, the real one, was a mailman who died earlier this year at age 42. Jerry Stevens is an opportunist who stole Mr. Carter’s identity and hatched a plan to con car dealers.

According to a report in the Columbus Dispatch, the scam began when a man walked into Jack Maxton Chevrolet and said that his father, Reggie Carter, was interested in a new Corvette. A short time later, the man identifying himself as Reggie Carter called and asked to apply for the car loan over the phone. He got preliminary approval to finance the car.

Later in the day, Jerry Stevens, posing as Reggie Carter, walked into the showroom with another man, whom he identified as his son. Mr. Stevens signed papers and produced a Michigan driver’s license with Mr. Carter’s name and signature on it, but his own picture.

The conmen drove onto the dealership lot in a new, black BMW convertible. Police think Jerry Stevens also used Reggie Carter’s identity to buy the BMW 650i for $59,000. The BMW was recovered when Kenyatta Reed, one of the “sons”, was stopped in the vehicle in a Detroit suburb.

The F & I director became suspicious when he noticed that the signature on the man’s driver’s license didn’t match the signatures on the credit application for the $67,000 car. This is where the story takes one of those “world’s dumbest crooks” turns.

The suspicious finance director called a phone number that Jerry Stevens had given him to verify employment. But the phone number belonged to Byron Carter and Dorothy Hooks-Carter, the brother and sister-in-law of the real Reggie Carter. The Carters blew the whistle on the attempted theft.

Jerry Stevens now stands indicted on charges of identity fraud, possession of criminal tools and five counts of forgery. He is cooling his heels in jail.