Car Dealer Pleads Guilty to Auto Loan Fraud

William Curtis Beede, 42, of Oregon has pled guilty to an auto loan scheme that he ran for almost three years. Beede made his first appearance in the auto loan fraud case this week and has pled guilty in federal court of bank fraud and wire fraud.

Beede was the owner of Yellowstone Auto Inc. and ran the auto loan fraud from late 2002 until July 2005. According to First Assistant U.S. Attorney Kurt Alme Beede borrowed money from Little Horn State bank to buy vehicles for resale. Once the cars were sold, Beede did not pay back the auto loans.

Beede also took out auto loans against the same cars with Automotive Finance Inc. and only part of the money went to buy the vehicles. Then from October 2004 until July 2005, Beede took out another auto loan to purchase more cars and did not repay AFC the money once they were sold.

The pattern continued with him taking out various auto loans against the cars, and eventually started taking out auto loans against cars he didn’t even own. AFC had given more than $72,000 to Beede. He is facing a max of 30 years in prison and a $1 million fine on the bank fraud count and max 20 years and $250,000 fine on the wire fraud count.




Back to March 2008 Archives