A man is in jail for allegedly duping local auto dealers into selling him vehicles.Investigators say 36-year old Christopher Mello passed off fraudulent personal checks at four different dealerships to purchase six vehicles as well as other merchandise.
The shocking part is the check's were in his name and were tied to his own account; there just wasn't any money there.
Investigators say workers gave him the cars before verifying the funds with the bank.
An undercover C.H.P. officer says he's never seen a fraud case like this one.
“It’s usually with somebody else's account. A washed check or printed a check, never his own. This was the first time I’ve seen that,” said C.H.P. Detective Perry Miller.
Mello has been in and out of prison over the years for similar crimes. Miller calls him a smooth talker.
“Interviewing him and talking to him you could see he could really put one over on somebody. He had a great story of how he got his money and the money was in the account,” said Miller.
The cars were apparently just used for joy rides. However, thousands of dollars in other merchandise like rims he purchased was sold.
“It was sold for drugs basically and pay bills he said,” said Miller.
Police caught on to mello thanks to teamwork between local dealers.
“Almost like a network they began to tell each other to watch out for this guy,” said Miller.
Using technology, Michael Chevrolet tracked the Corvette Mello had to the area of Millbrook and Shields.
Thursday afternoon, investigators caught his girlfriend inside. Not wanting to see her get punished, Mello turned himself in.
“Fortunately we were able to get back all the cars. That's a plus and the dealerships were very happy,” said Miller.
Dealers we talked involved in this investigation chose not to comment.
