His new roommate, Brant Holloway, is a friendly, well-mannered local business owner.
The two become fast friends, so when Brant suggests they go into business together, Therin is intrigued.
His escape helped by his girlfriend, also a National Guard member is a tale of courage and honesty.
[00:00:03] Therin Miller: I laid everything out to him.
What do you mean?"
And he’s like, “It sounds like this is the mob.”
I’m like man, I’ve lost everything.
(MUSIC SEGUE)
[00:00:34] Bob: Welcome back to The Perfect Scam.
I’m your host, Bob Sullivan.
And happy New Year.
And that mightve been the least of his problems.
The situation is scarier than anything Therin faced during two tours of combat duty in the Middle East.
If you think your bad roommate story is dramatic, well, wait until you hear this one.
So for now, meet Therin Miller as he decides it might be nice to have a roommate.
[00:02:34] Bob: Thank you for your service.
[00:02:35] Therin Miller: Thank you.
[00:02:37] Bob: Uh what’s it like being in the National Guard?
But, you know, after 18 years, you’re ready to get out.
(chuckle) So I’m ready to retire, I’m looking forward to retirement.
[00:02:57] Bob: A few years ago, Therin begins planning for life after the Guard.
His entrepreneurial spirit has him studying business models, and he’s fishing around for an idea.
So he decides to make a change.
[00:03:16] Therin Miller: Yeah.
[00:03:44] Bob: It was a good deal sharing that big house.
And Therin gets a lot of interest quickly.
[00:04:11] Bob: Therin likes Brant right away.
You know oddly enough, I mean I, it was, it was like looking in a mirror.
[00:04:40] Therin Miller: Yeah, he was uh, he’s about my age.
I mean just your average looking guy.
I mean, you know, good looking guy.
I mean I; I was definitely impressed.
[00:05:02] Bob: Brant is an entrepreneur too.
He owns a few businesses around town, so right away Therin thinks this is a good match.
Anyway, things are looking up for Therin now.
He’s just started dating an old friend from the Guard, Kirsten Strickler.
[00:05:16] Kirsten Strickler: I’m actually from Dallas, Texas.
[00:05:45] Bob: Is, is that how you met Therin?
So I, I, I knew him pretty well.
Yeah, we met through the military, and then um, eventually started dating.
So we’d maybe see each other every other week tops.
[00:06:19] Bob: Kirsten likes Brant too.
The group of fast friends often have dinner together.
He seemed like a nice, friendly, local, business owner.
He and I bonded very quickly.
He was a college athlete.
I was a college athlete, so, you know, we got along very well upfront.
You know Therin had been divorced at that point for a couple of years.
[00:06:57] Bob: And so what did you play in college?
[00:07:00] Kirsten Strickler: I actually wrestled.
I wrestled for Oklahoma City University.
[00:07:03] Bob: Oh wow.
And, and, what, what did uh, what was Brant’s sport?
[00:07:06] Kirsten Strickler: I think he played baseball.
He was definitely a taller guy, probably uh probably close to 6 foot, 180 to 190 pounds.
[00:07:29] Therin Miller: Yeah, we actually did become friends pretty quickly.
First it was a great relationship, and we went out to eat, uh we hung out.
[00:07:59] Bob: In fact if feels like more than a roommate relationship.
Therin feels like maybe Brant is just the right person for him to meet at just the right time.
I kind of looked at him as, as a mentor, exactly right.
And I was like, “Yeah, okay.
Let’s hear it.”
You know, “I think that it would be good.
I, I don’t know anything about car dealerships.
Like I know nothing.”
[00:09:45] Bob: Therin is open to anything at this point.
But a car dealership?
He’d never even considered that before.
And he’s like, “Well you don’t have to, don’t worry about that.
I’ve, I understand that piece of it.
[00:10:49] Therin Miller: Yeah, completely out of left field for me.
I didn’t know anything about it.
And I was like, holy crap.
[00:11:43] Bob: Therin doesn’t just jump in right away.
He takes his time and starts doing a lot of research.
This is the area that I’m going to be set up in.
This is the kind of cars we’re going to have.
This is what we’re going to do.
You’d submit that to the financial institution, and they would basically lend on that.
So conversation quickly turns back to, how can they fund the startup costs?
What’s the next steps, Brant?”
And he was like, “Well, you know, let’s see.
Do you think you’ve got the option to get money from a bank?”
And I was like, “Well I mean I don’t know.”
I, I had a really great credit.
You know, I did well for myself.
You’ve got a great credit.
You guys got a good solid plan here.
And I said, “All right, well, what all does that entail?”
[00:14:06] Bob: Nontraditional funding?
What does that mean?
An excellent question, but the financial advisor has all the answers.
We’ll pay that off, we’ll pay that back easy."
I was like, “Okay, well, what, let’s see what happens.”
That sounds like a lot, but Brant’s confidence wins over Therin, and they take the plunge.
Pretty quickly Lyle comes back with good news.
I got you a, I can get you about a half a million dollars in funding."
That was kind of a huge news to me.
I was like, whoa.
That’s, I didn’t expect a half a million dollars in funding.
He was like, “Yeah, you’re, everything looks good for you, man.
We can do this.”
[00:15:58] Bob: A half million dollars.
Therin is well on his way to owning his first business.
There’s just some paperwork to fill out.
Lyle gives Therin very specific instructions.
So I did that.
But these are not traditional business loans.
Therin asks how they’re structured, and Lyle tells him.
The expensive cars serve as collateral.
They are title loans.
And they are coming in rapid fire.
[00:17:40] Bob: So these were like $70,000 loans on a single car?
There was a few other luxury cars in there, some Mercedes, uh, higher end Mercedes.
Yeah, it was luxury, luxury vehicles that uh were anywhere from 70 to 90 thousand dollars.
I didn’t do business loans; it was before I really got into business lending.
[00:18:40] Bob: Laughing at her small commission?
But there is something else that Therin tells her that bothers her too.
But it seemed logical enough at the time.
Like, “We’re doing all the operations, we’re doing everything.
And I’m like, “Wait a second.
I’m bringing all the money, like what do you mean I’m not doing anything?
I’m, I, I’m bringing all the funding.
It’s, it’s me.”
And, and, and to take a, a back seat into this business.”
And so, I’m starting to kind of get upset.
I’ll, I’ll call you back."
You know, what, why the hell right now?
Actually I, I actually think that we can only maybe give you 10%."
[00:21:04] Bob: Therin is spitting bullets mad at this sudden turn of events.
It feels like an ambush.
Why, why now?
Why, why all of a sudden.
Everything has been good up to this point.
You’ve had me go around with you to all these dealerships.
Youve gotten, you know, our dealership license from the, the state.
Youre out of your mind."
[00:21:46] Bob: Kirsten doesn’t like the sound of this either.
He’s like, “They want to reduce my ownership share down to 20%.”
And I was like, okay.
We had a couple of drinks, and we talked about opening up a car dealership."
And he was like, “Yeah, yeah, I remember you.
I remember you.”
And I said, “Oh, that’s awesome.
Can I come in and, and you know talk to you a little bit.
Can I come in and just ask you some questions?”
And he’s like, “Yeah, sure.
Meet me after work, you know at, at a local bar.”
And so I was like, “Okay.
That sounds good.”
And I said, “Most of the moneys been mailed out.
And uh, I was like, “I’m sorry?
What do you mean?”
And he’s like, “It sounds like this is the mob.”
And I was like, “What?”
I’m like man, this, I’ve lost everything.
Like what the hell happened, how the hell, how did it get to this?
What can he do?
He’s like, “You’ve got to get the money back.
And I said, “Well I think I can.”
[00:24:20] Bob: Get the money back?
How is he going to get half a million dollars back?
Lyle, in Florida, has it.
I mean I’d be throwing up.
How, how did that go?
I truly believe that.
I mean every day I would wake up throwing up.
Every day I would wake up throwing up.
I mean I would, I was scared out of my mind.
The car dealer who he’d spoken with at the bar helps him with some of the logistics.
[00:26:00] Therin Miller: I bought two plane tickets for me and my dad.
We were going to go down to, to Boca Raton, Florida.
Here’s the thing, if I’m dealing with the mob, what am…
I can’t just walk in.
And he’s like, “No, no, no.
When you, when you guys land, there’ll be a car waiting for you.
[00:26:34] Bob: The plan might sound rash, but Therin isn’t exactly thinking straight.
I was like, you know, I, I uh, I’ve lost everything.
All that was for nothing.
Two combat tours was for nothing.
But when Therin tells her about the trip to Florida, she kicks into high gear.
[00:27:49] Bob: And what she finds if flat out terrifying.
Me and my dad are going to go down there…” And I was like, “Stop.
You are dealing with some really dangerous people.
[00:28:09] Bob: Dealing with some really dangerous people.
Kirsten has to convince Therin not to go.
[00:28:21] Kirsten Strickler: Oh yeah.
He’d already bought the ticket.
[00:28:24] Bob: And, and I think his father was going to go with him.
I mean it just sounds like walking into a den of thieves.
[00:28:29] Kirsten Strickler: Yes.
We’re, we’re going to, I’m going to go back and get that money.”
[00:28:58] Therin Miller: She said, “Don’t go.
These guys are, are not good people.”
And so I said, um, “Well we leave in the morning.
I’ve got a flight that leaves at like 7 in the morning.
And she’s like, “I’m leaving work.
I’m coming up there.”
And that snaps Therin out of it, at least for now.
He tells his dad they aren’t flying to Florida that day.
[00:29:34] Therin Miller: And she brought up with her a huge accordion folder.
I mean just a huge accordion folder of documents.
[00:29:58] Bob: Lyle, the finance guy, is Lyle Livesay.
And according to Kirsten’s research, he is the right-hand man for a Russian-born mobster.
A man named Mani Chulpayev.
She thinks Therin could be the next one to end up in the trunk of a car.
[00:31:17] Bob: If you go down to Florida, you’re not coming back alive?
How did a simple ad for a roommate on craigslist escalate to this so quickly?
More important, how can Therin get out of it?
Now he thinks he’s signed a bunch of loans and given the money to the Russian mob.
And he’s on the hook for a half a million dollars.
He desperately needs a new plan.
Kirsten tells him straight he’s in over his head.
He’s liable for the money and maybe for committing crimes too.
I was like, “If I were you, you oughta go straight to the FBI.”
[00:32:44] Bob: Therin now finds himself in a dark, lonely place.
What choice does he make?
That’s next week on The Perfect Scam.
Call the AARP Fraud Watch web connection Helpline at 877-908-3360.
Their trained fraud specialists can provide you with free support and guidance on what to do next.
That address again is: theperfectscampodcast@aarp.org.
Be sure to find us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
For AARP’s The Perfect Scam, I’m Bob Sullivan.
