heavy equipment purchasing fraud

[cwt1990]

Back in February a friend of mine purchased two Caterpillar backhoes from a company out of Florida. The units were located in Mississippi, and were owned by the local government there. They invoiced him, and he paid the invoice in full. They kept stalling and telling us it was a matter of paperwork being filed in the town that owned the machines. After a month he told him that he was going to send in a truck to pick up the machines, if they liked it or not. When the truck got there, the 2 units were there but the person in charge told me that they had not been paid for. It is now basically August and since then they have refunded him $7,500 Dollars of the $29,500 he was initially invoiced. We also found out a couple of months ago that a company in Miami had also been invoiced for these same machines, serial numbers were identical. We are trying to figure out what the best course of action is. After losing so much money on the deal, he barely has enough money to hire a lawyer. This is clearly a case of fraud. Another thing is that my friend and I are from Mexico which is making it extremely difficult to do something about this. He does not speak english and I do, so I am trying to help him out. Can anyone help us or give us some advice?

 

[PayrollHRGuy]

You don't mention what state you and more importantly your friend are in but you will likely need to sue the "seller" in Florida. You need to contact a lawyer there.

You should have no problem finding a Spanish speaking lawyer in Miami.

 

[Zigner]

You don't mention what state you and more importantly your friend are in...

The OP said that both are from Mexico.

...but you will likely need to sue the "seller" in Florida. You need to contact a lawyer there.

You should have no problem finding a Spanish speaking lawyer in Miami.

I agree with the rest of your post. The OP's not going to be able to do this on his own.

 

[PayrollHRGuy]

I noticed that but wasn't sure if they meant the past tense "from" or not.

 

[xylene]

Have you involved the police or the government?

This seems like some very serious fraud involving the disposal of government owned surplus property.

They often take these kinds of crimes very seriously as fraud involving the disposal of surplus government property is a crime against the people and a very common avenue for fraud agaisnt and within local government.