An Inspection Is Worth a Thousand Photos

ED MADGE

Unlike most antique car buffs, William Honaker didn't take his old Fords to auto shows. Few people even knew he owned them — but somehow someone kept stealing them, he said. Eleven times, in fact, in five months he had different antique cars stolen. William owned and operated an automobile parts business near Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and had a nice rambling home that looked as if it had been moved from a hacienda in Arizona. The Honaker house covered about a half-acre in a large suburban area of Sunlight Ranches near Fort Lauderdale. He owned and drove a brand-new Cadillac but collected antique Fords. William was married and had two children, a boy and a girl, ages nine and 11, who attended a private school near his home. Overall, he thought he had done very well for a high-school dropout.

To their neighbors, the Honakers seemed like the typical suburban family. William left for work every morning around seven and dropped off his children at school on the way. Joan, William's wife, picked up the children and brought them home in the afternoon before going to her job as a nurse in a nearby hospital.

William had very few close friends, and most of his social network consisted of acquaintances he met through work. William also fancied himself as a country western artist, and he had cut an album featuring military blues tunes. He used the name Billy Appleton to record the album in Nashville. But this Billy had a dark side.

One of William's acquaintances was a car salesman named James Santini, who had a nasty cocaine habit. William also spent time (unbeknownst to his wife) with his girlfriend, Mary Osceola, a Seminole Indian who lived on the reservation west of Fort Lauderdale. Mary was divorced from her husband, Jimmy, a police officer in a large municipality in southern Broward County. One other acquaintance, Roy Gordon, was a guitar player in the band that did the background music on Billy's album. Roy lived in a small duplex in Fort Lauderdale and commuted to Nashville to play with some of the city's biggest artists. This diverse quartet began collaborating on a side project, but it wasn't a musical endeavor.

Billy and his ragtag group started working with small, independent insurance agencies in close proximity to one another in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The agencies specialized in antique automobile insurance and accepted insurance applications by mail. Billy tested the water with these insurers by receiving coverage for his real Fords but then quickly branched out.

Start Your Engines

I sat at my desk in the criminal investigations division of Florida's public safety department, absentmindedly staring out the window. It was Friday afternoon and the weather outlook was promising a great weekend for South Florida, warm with low humidity and beautiful blue skies. Of course, it was October, the beginning of tourist season. It was also the time of year when fishing was really fantastic off the southeast coast — prefect for hitting the Gulf Stream and picking up those elusive dolphin and wahoo that I knew would be just waiting to jump on my line. Well, I could dream, couldn't I?

A phone call jarred me from these musings and back to my role as a lead investigator for the state. After I hung up the telephone, I picked up my pad of notes and headed for Lieutenant Goodell's office. At least this would keep me from sitting behind my desk shuffling through incoming paperwork for a while. I was tired of looking at the gray cloth walls of my cubicle with all of the photographs and bulletins. Those incoming cases were the standard fare I reviewed every day before assigning them to one of the investigators in the financial crime unit.

I knocked on the frame of Goodell's door because the door was partially open. He answered my knock with a low, monotone voice that sounded like he wasn't having a very good day. I said, “Got a minute?” as I entered and he said, “Have a seat; for you I have the time, but these end-of-month stats are driving me up the wall. Whatcha got?” he asked. Goodell, a very sharp administrator with a keen nose for interesting cases, was all ears. I told him about the phone call I had just received from Betty Allen and John Bundy at Bundy Insurance Company. Betty, John's secretary, had brought to Bundy's attention two documents that looked as if they were typed on the same typewriter. One was an application for a 1939 Ford convertible coupe insured by a party named William Honaker. The Hub Group had insured that vehicle and had subsequently received a claim that the vehicle was stolen. The other was an application from James Santini for a 1940 Ford Convertible Super Deluxe.

Lieutenant Goodell asked a few pretty routine questions: the jurisdiction of the alleged crime, how many hours I would need to complete the case, and so on. I told him it looked like something I could wrap up in a few weeks. Little did I know how wrong I would turn out to be. When I finished my cursory briefing, Goodell gave me the green light to use whatever resources I needed, with a closing caveat of “Be careful; it's a real jungle out there.” I returned to my cubicle.

When I reached my desk, I decided to call the Hub Group in Tampa, Florida, which insured one of Honaker's vehicles. While I was speaking with April, the representative, she asked me to hold for a minute while she checked something. When she returned to the phone, she told me that she had remembered another recent claim on an antique Ford and wanted to check it. In August the Hub Group had insured a 1941 Ford convertible for Mary Osceola. The agency that had referred the policy to them had requested an inspection of the vehicle. I asked if this was a normal course of business for them, and she said it wasn't in the case of antique automobiles. But before the Hub Group could arrange a vehicle inspection, the car was reported stolen. Because of Florida's insurance “good faith” law, the Hub Group was going to have to pay the claim within 30 days of receipt. Hub's management was waiting for Mary to be deposed by an attorney in Fort Lauderdale before paying the claim. I asked April to send me copies of the supporting documents that Mary submitted to them and let me know when and where the deposition was to take place.

Now all I needed were the documents, a background check on Mary and William, and an analysis from the crime lab. This should be a piece of cake, I thought, and take me away from the mundane forgery cases that that cluttered my desk. Based on the information I received from Betty Allen and John Bundy, it didn't need much manpower. The original documents were being sent overnight Express Mail, so I should get them on Monday.

When I returned to the office on Monday after a peaceful weekend of fishing, I checked with Bill, the mail room clerk, to see if the package had arrived. He was sorting through the mail that had arrived over the weekend and said he would call my office if he found my package. I arrived at the office around 8:30 a.m. and met with Wanda, my secretary, who had a handful of new cases for me to review. It's remarkable how the reports just keep piling up. This area was what we in law enforcement referred to as Fraud Lauderdale. We also knew that fraudsters worked here in the winter rather than in Buffalo. We couldn't be the only ones in the country with such a case overload, could we?

At about 8:50, Bill called from the mail room and said, “I've got your package; come on down and pick it up.” I did not wait for the elevator at this time of the morning; employees tied it up coming to work. I hit the stairs and in a flash was standing at the mail room counter. Bill handed me the package and I headed to the copy room on the way to my office, opened the package and made two copies of the documents Betty sent. One of them was an application for insurance for a 1940 Ford Super Deluxe Convertible bearing the owner's name of William Honaker. The other was an application for insurance for a 1940 Ford Super Deluxe Convertible and the owner was listed as James Santini. Both applications were typed and bore different serial numbers for the vehicles. The owners lived approximately 23 miles apart, one in a suburb of Fort Lauderdale and the other in a different municipality. I headed to the analysis department to ask my colleague Janice to conduct background checks on Honaker, Santini and Mary Osceola.

When I got to my desk, I made a call to the crime lab and spoke with Greg Sanders. He was the in-house expert on forged documents and was often an expert witness in court. I explained the documents to him, all typewritten with the exception of signatures. Greg recommended that I send the documents to the state lab in Tampa, and he gave me the name of Steve Upland, a specialist in typewritten specimens. I called Steve and explained the documents to him. He assured me that he would be able to determine from the original documents whether they were both authored on the same typewriter. Steve said, “I can tell what brand of typewriter typed the documents.” I asked him to handle the documents with gloves because my lab would want to perform tests for fingerprints too.

Rather than mail the documents to Tampa, I decided to deliver them to save time and maintain chain of custody. I made a property receipt with a case number attached to the package. The case classification was kept as a “Police Information,” since we had no real evidence of fraud.

Bringing on a Navigator

I drove to Tampa on Tuesday morning and delivered the documents to Upland for examination. I returned to my office in Fort Lauderdale and gave Lieutenant Goodell an update on my progress. I called the state department of insurance to see if they would be interested in a joint investigation, and the woman I spoke with agreed to send an agent to help tomorrow.

I arrived at the office on Wednesday morning and had message to call Paul Wilson at the department of insurance. I returned his call and we arranged to meet at 10:00 a.m. at my office. When I went down to meet him at the reception desk, I immediately noticed that he had a striking likeness of Clark Gable, right down to the pencil-thin mustache. He was impeccably dressed in a three-piece suit, was over six feet tall and had close-cropped dark hair sprinkled with gray. We went to my desk where I showed him copies of the documents I had so far. He looked through them and without hesitation said, “I think they were both done on the same machine.” I said, “I think so too, but it is not going to be that easy.” He wrote the names of the two applicants on his notepad and borrowed my phone to call his office and have them run the names through their databases.

Ten minutes later while we were getting coffee in the cafeteria his cell phone rang. “It's my office,” he said, and stepped in the hallway to take the call. When he returned he said, “This is going to be one helluva case.” Paul's databases showed several other insurance applications — all typewritten and within the past eight months — submitted for antique automobile insurance to several different insurers. I called state attorneys and briefed John Jenkins, an investigator. He said he would see if he could find an empty office space that Paul and I use at their facility. John's reasoning was legal documents would be more accessible there. In the meantime, Paul and I decided it was time to “put some boots on the ground” and begin surveillance of our three suspects.

On Thursday and Friday, after checking with Lieutenant Goodell, I moved my files and equipment to an empty conference room in the state attorney's office that John had reserved for me. It was an ideal location for continuing the investigation. Paul and I were only steps from the office of the section chief, Lenny Kent, an experienced financial crimes prosecutor; Kent and his staff gave us a hearty welcome.

I returned to my office and assigned investigator John Mallony the task of reviewing incoming cases while I handled this one. I visited the analyst department and picked up additional information obtained by Janice on Honaker and Santini. I took the weekend off but couldn't shake the thought of our next moves in the investigation. Janice had put a lot of information together on the subjects' criminal backgrounds. The package contained known associates of Santini and Honaker as well as property information. I looked it over during the weekend and made some notes. I'd brief Paul on Monday at the office. Janice had found no information on Mary Osceola.

Monday morning I arrived at the office early and laid out some of the association matrices that Janice had put together on the conference table. When Paul arrived, he walked around the conference table and added some more documents he had picked up at his office. The paperwork showed several other insurance companies had received applications on antique Fords in South Florida in the past eight months.

Since both of the initial applications we had were typed, we concentrated on the other ones that were also typed — they all looked like they were done on the same machine as the documents submitted to the lab. We had copies, but we needed the originals for lab comparison, so we spent the next two months assembling the originals to send to Steve Upland. Additionally, each application came with a photograph of the car being insured.

We began surveillance of Honaker's home and business and Santini's home. We were unable to conduct surveillance of Osceola because she lived on an Indian reservation, which is federal land. We had nothing to tie the suspects to each other, but we hoped the surveillance would provide the evidence we needed.

The surveillance team recorded the license plates of cars coming and going from all the locations and sent them to Janice to analyze. I made contact with the Antique Ford Motor Club of South Florida and requested their assistance. Paul contacted other insurance companies known to specialize in antique and collectible cars and asked for information on insurance applications for cars fitting our profile.

An analysis of the applications we uncovered showed Honaker using several aliases to insure a total of 12 antique cars manufactured from 1939 to 1948. The applications began in November of the previous year and continued through October, when my investigation began. Starting in March in the current year and continuing through December, Honaker and his team began reporting the vehicles stolen to the insurance companies. Traditionally these types of policies have low premiums and high payoffs because collectors' vehicles are rarely stolen.

Becoming Car Buffs

During this investigation, Paul and I learned more than we ever thought we'd know about antique cars. For example, Fords circa 1940 are extremely difficult to steal without keys or a flatbed wrecker because they have a large, round steel locking device on the steering wheel that makes it impossible to turn the wheel without the keys in the ignition.

I contacted a local antique car collector, Larry Lawson, who belonged to the Antique Ford Motor Club of South Florida. I asked if Honaker, Santini or Osceola were members of the club, but Larry told me no. He asked what kind of cars they owned, and I told him about the 1939, 1940, 1941 and 1948 Fords listed on the various insurance applications. He said, “The ′39, ′40 and ′48 are quite common and I thought I knew everyone in the area who owns those. The ′41, now that's another story, very rare, because of the war, there weren't that many made and no one around here has one — I'd know it. I haven't seen one of those bullnose cars in quite a while, even at car shows.” Things were coming together now, at least in my mind. It looked like we were dealing with “paper” cars being insured.

John Bundy called to tell me that he had just refused to insure a 1940 Ford that Santini had applied for. I told him we had contacted all of the antique automobile insurers and told them to flag Santini, Honaker and Osceola in their files and let us know if future applications or claims were filed.

In addition to the surveillance we were running on Honaker and Santini, we began to subpoena bank and telephone records. Janice began tracing the numbers in Honaker's business phone. Bank records showed Honaker's business was in financial distress.

Steve Upland called and told me that the first two applications we had submitted had been typed on the same machine — an Olympia manual typewriter. He said if we recovered a typewriter, he could let us know if it was the same one used on the documents. I told Upland we would send the other applications to him for typewriter identification. Next we had the original applications sent to another lab for fingerprinting. Three days later we received the results, and they were in our favor. Honaker's and Santini's fingerprints were on Santini's application. The second application only had Honaker's prints.

April, the representative at the Hub Group whom I spoke to at the beginning of the case, called to tell me that Mary Osceola's deposition had been scheduled and gave me the details. Paul and I decided to arrange surveillance outside the building because we were not allowed into the deposition, and we joined the experts in the parking lot. We saw Honaker arrive in his Cadillac with Osceola in the passenger seat. She exited the car and went into the building while Honaker waited in his vehicle. So far, so good for establishing that connection. Mary returned to the Cadillac and Honaker drove off. I later learned from April that during the deposition, Mary stated that she was a member of the Antique Ford Motor Club, which was later disproved. I called Osceola's ex-husband — a police officer in a large municipality in our county — and asked if Mary owned a collectible 1941 Ford car. James laughed and said, “She can't afford the gas cap for that kind of automobile; are you kidding?”

While this was going on, we had an analyst tracing calls from Honaker's phone records and discovered that he was in contact with three particularly interesting numbers: Lowell Bohling in Walker, Iowa; Snuffy's Antique Cars in Cedar Rapids, Iowa; and Nils Johansen of Karlstad, Minnesota. Bank records showed Honaker was making car payments to a bank in Cedar Rapids on a 1948 Ford automobile. Investigation revealed that Lowell Bohling had purchased the car unrestored, restored it and sold it to Snuffy's. According to Bernice Keenan, the title clerk for Snuffy's, the car was sold to Honaker and he was making payments to the bank. Records showed that even after Honaker had reported the car stolen, he continued to make payments to the bank. Once he collected the insurance premium on the car, he negotiated another deal for a 1940 Ford Super Deluxe Convertible. The vehicle was bought in the same manner as the 1948 and shipped to Honaker's business. Snuffy's had the negative films of all of the vehicles they had sold on file, and I asked him to send me photos of the cars. When they arrived I recognized that all the photos Honaker, Santini and Osceola submitted with insurance applications were taken at Snuffy's. Additionally, the supporting documents that had been submitted came from Nils Johansen, who sold “old car memorabilia” from junked cars. The photographs were sent to Honaker as a potential investor in those vehicles. The only photograph that was not taken at Snuffy's was that of the 1941 Ford insured and reported stolen by Osceola.

Seeing What's Behind the Photos

Gordon Kelly, the owner of Gordon Kelly's Insurance Agency in New Jersey, contacted Paul and said he received an application from James Santini for a 1940 Ford Super Deluxe with serial number 18-5645689; Santini also sent a photograph of the vehicle — it was the same one that Bundy declined to insure. Gordon Kelly referred the application to National Collectors Insurance, and they requested an inspection of the car before issuing the coverage. As soon as I saw the photograph I realized it was taken at the home of Larry Lawson, the head of the Antique Motor Club of South Florida. I contacted Larry and he told me the car belonged to Billy Appleton, who had taken the picture while visiting Larry on the pretext of joining the club. Larry had not seen or heard from Appleton since then.

National Collectors contacted Paul when the inspection had been scheduled, and he asked the adjuster, Lisa Papkolaskis, to meet us. She also agreed to ask Santini for additional photos of the car before the inspection, and he submitted a few different ones. We could tell that they were all taken in front of Honaker's home. So that we could get a better read on Santini, Lisa agreed to take Marilyn Williams, a detective on my team, with her as a “trainee” learning how to do inspections.

I set up surveillance of Honaker's house and Santini's apartment for the night before and the day of the inspection. During the evening, Shane Clement, head of surveillance, called to tell me that Honaker had moved the 1940 Super Deluxe to an underground garage at Santini's apartment.

The following morning we briefed Lisa and Marilyn on what to ask Santini, and then I checked with tech support; they were on location ready for the inspection team to arrive. Marilyn was equipped with a body transmitter to record the entire transaction. When they arrived at Santini's, Lisa requested that he move the car out of the garage to the open parking lot because they needed more light. He did so but had trouble locating the key on his very large key ring. Lisa asked Santini where the serial number was located, but he said he did not know. She quickly saw that it had been removed.

After Lisa and Marilyn left, the surveillance team saw Honaker arrive at Santini's apartment and drive the Ford back to his home while Santini followed in Honaker's Cadillac. When they arrived at Honaker's, the surveillance crew there saw another antique vehicle in his garage. We were at this point five months into our “short” investigation and had probable cause for arrest and search warrants.

One More for the Road

I received another call from John Bundy, who said he had an application for a 1947 Ford convertible with documents and photographs submitted by Roy Gordon of Fort Lauderdale. I drove by the address and saw no such vehicle, so I contacted Gordon directly. After identifying myself, I showed him a photograph of the 1947 Ford. He immediately said, “That's not my car; I've never seen it. Billy Appleton asked me to sign an application for insurance on it because he couldn't insure any more antiques in his name.” Gordon gave me a sworn affidavit attesting to this fact and cooperated fully in the case.

I obtained arrest and search warrants the following day and sent out teams to make simultaneous arrests. Paul and I served two search warrants on Honaker's home and business and arrested Honaker at his business while serving the first search warrant. He cooperated fully and told us where we would find his files on the antique vehicles. When we served the search warrant at his residence, two antique Fords were confiscated, both with the serial numbers removed — the 1940 that he had driven to the inspection and a 1948 convertible — and an old Olympia typewriter, like the one used to type the applications. Other files and paperwork were taken as evidence of other “vehicles” he was ready to insure under aliases. If Honaker had filed all of the applications he had prepared and been paid the premiums, he would have collected more than $2 million in payoffs.

Only two cars belonged to the fraudsters; the rest were insured based on fraudulent paperwork and photographs of vehicles owned by others (later all identified) or by Snuffy's. Roy Gordon became a state witness for the prosecution. Honaker, Santini and Osceola were charged with 134 various felonies, and, before trial, they each pleaded guilty to the charges. All three received 25 years of probation and were ordered to reimburse the insurance companies and the sheriff's office for the expense of the investigation.

About the Author

Ed Madge is a CFE, regent emeritus of the ACFE and retired detective sergeant from South Florida. He was the first law enforcement recipient of the CFE of the year award in 2002. Mr. Madge is currently a police science/criminal justice faculty instructor at Nashville State Community College in Cookeville, Tennessee, and an ardent supporter of the ACFE.