Another 15 criminal charges have been filed against a family of
tow truck operators accused of gaming the small claims court
system.
Morgan Hill – Another 15 criminal charges have been filed against a family of tow truck operators accused of gaming the small claims court system.
In its second amended felony complaint, the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office accused Vincent Cardinalli Sr. of lying on court forms and convincing a person who delivers legal papers to submit false documents to the court. All but two of the felony counts were leveled against Cardinalli. Prosecutors also charged Cardinalli’s son, Paul Greer, with attempted grand theft and with lying on court forms about the number of cases he filed in a year.
Attorneys for Cardinalli and Greer could not be reached for comment.
The charges stem from hundreds of lawsuits filed by Cardinalli, 64, and Greer, 30, in hopes of collecting towing and storage fees for their defunct towing businesses.
Cardinalli’s A&R Towing operated out of Hollister under a number of different names until about 2004, the same year Greer’s B&C Towing, of Gilroy, was fired by the California Highway Patrol for what it deemed business practices bordering on the “criminal.”
Cardinalli and Greer (formerly Vincent Bruce Cardinalli Jr.) turned their towing businesses into a gold mine, collectively filing nearly 2,000 cases in small claims courts over the past seven years in San Benito and Santa Clara counties, according to a Dispatch investigation earlier this year. Those cases have left a trail of defendants who say they had little or no relation to vehicles towed by Cardinalli and Greer.
To date, the district attorney has filed 115 charges against Cardinalli, his son Greer, daughter Rosemary Ball and her husband Michael, as well as a process server. All five were arrested in June.
In the latest round of charges, prosecutors allege that Cardinalli convinced a second process server, Timothy Donovan, to inflate the costs of his legal service on sworn court forms so that Cardinalli could recover a larger judgment from defendants. Judges and court commissioners routinely allowed Cardinalli and Greer to tack on court fees, often reaching into the hundreds of dollars, to a judgment covering towing and storage fees, according to the Dispatch investigation.
Cardinalli also was accused in the latest complaint of falsely stating on court forms that his towing company was a properly registered business, and for filing false documents with the courts. Greer was charged with stating on a court form that he had not filed more than 12 small claims cases exceeding $2,500 in the prior 12 months. Cases beyond that threshold trigger higher court fees.
The charge of attempted grand theft against Greer stems from a 2005 case involving Karen Leavitt. Despite producing documents to prove she sold a 1990 Acura to an Oregon resident, the Morgan Hill resident said she settled with Greer after a court commissioner sided against her. A few months after settling for $1,600, Greer again tried to collect from her on the same car, she said.
“I think it’s about time that this man was held accountable,” Leavitt said. “I’m not the only person that he took advantage of financially.”
Dale Lohman, a district attorney with the major fraud division who is in charge of the case, was not available for comment.
