LAWRENCEVILLE, Ga. — Lawrenceville authorities are searching for two men they say worked for a used car dealership and ran an elaborate scheme to pocket people's deposits.
"It’s a really sad situation that these two suspects took advantage of people in need," said Capitan Salvador Ortega with the Lawrenceville Police Department.
Since February, Lawrenceville Police Department investigators have been following up on complaints made about Auto Star located at 220 Scenic Highway. Customers reported the business, claiming the car dealership was defrauding them.
After interviewing people and looking into more than a dozen reports, detectives said the scheme was rooted in two employees who were defrauding customers out of thousands of dollars.
According to police, Alexander Weigard, 27, and Ibrahim Ali, 30, would act as if they were the managers of the business.
"The suspects, collected or ask the victims for a down payment for a car and once the victims provided the cash, the suspects told them to come back the following day," Ortega explained. "But when the victims returned the following day, they were told by the suspects, the loan was denied, and that per policy, there was a no refund policy for the dealership."
Detectives said the two would pocket the cash instead.
Evidence shows that the two men would never complete loan paperwork or start the loan process and would actually convince customers to come to the dealership via social media through fake company accounts including Atlanta Highline Motors and Atlanta Motor Source, investigators said.
Police informed the owners of Auto Star about the complaints and investigation and both Weigard and Ali were fired. Officers obtained warrants for their arrest but the two remain on the run, according to LPD.
"A lot of these people, saved money for a long time, for months even years to buy the car of their dreams, they go there to find those two individuals and now their hard-earned money, is gone," Ortega said.
Anyone who knows of their whereabouts or may have been defrauded by the men are urged to contact LPD at 770-670-5172 or to contact the detective on the case via email jwoods@lawrencevillepd.com