The owner of a Utah County tenting trailer commercial enterprise has been charged with pocketing insurance cash and promoting a trailer he become purported to restore for a patron.
Benjamin Ashley Grimes, 46, of Springville, become charged Friday in 4th District Court with theft through deception, promoting or shopping for without identity numbers, and fraudulent alteration of an identification number, all second-degree felonies.
In 2015, a man who lives in Homer, Alaska, “placed an order for an extreme tenting trailer manufactured on the Moby1 Expedition Trailer production” at 221 W. 900 North, in Springville.
In 2017, the Alaska resident traveled to Springville and took possession of his camper. But only some weeks later, the camper was involved in an twist of fate in California, in line with charging documents. The man took the camper trailer lower back to Moby1 to have maintenance made.
An coverage agreement of more than $20,000 changed into then sent to Grimes to carry out upkeep on the trailer, in keeping with the fees. Instead, prosecutors say Grimes “failed to return the repaired trailer, and the budget have been no longer lower back to” the owner or the insurance agency.
“He ordered his employees to detach the higher teardrop shipment part of the trailer from the body and region that cargo part on every other body and (Grimes) sold that trailer as new to any other unidentified purchaser. (Grimes) took the VIN wide variety tags from (the) original trailer frame, which have been stickers, and proceeded to get rid of the numbers off the trailer body with paint thinner,” the costs state.
As of Friday, the Alaska owner “has in no way had his trailer returned to him or received the proceeds from his coverage declare agreement,” in step with the charges.
In March, the Alaska trailer owner filed a lawsuit towards Moby1, Grimes and his wife. In the lawsuit, the owner states he became identified with terminal most cancers and the trailer changed into going to be his manner of spending his “final time of right health on the street camping and visiting family.”
But no matter severa calls, the man said Grimes in no way referred to as him back.
“The defendants have no longer responded to (the person’s) numerous tries at communique when you consider that Nov. 3, 2018,” the lawsuit states. “During the approximately years that (his) tour trailer has been in the defendants’ ownership, (the man’s) fitness has deteriorated. (He) is not able to remain faraway from his home for durations longer than approximately weeks. Due to defendants’ failure to complete their responsibilities … (the man) turned into and could be not able to spend his remaining time of properly fitness traveling and traveling family.”
