In another case of alleged lease fraud, a father-and-son team is accused of duping people into renting homes from them that they didn't really own, Channel 2 Action News reports.
Roger Dudley Mason and his son, Taylor Martin Legrand Mason, are Powder Springs men who previously performed together as a cover band called Smokestack Barons before they decided to go into real estate. Now, they're inmates at Cobb County Jail.
One of their alleged victims, Shawn Hoga, had been contacted by the men through Facebook and had rented a home from them for his family of seven in Powder Springs. Hoga did not realize anything was amiss until one day a law enforcement official came calling.
“He asked us to produce the lease and a form of identification, and of course we did, and he said, ‘This is not your home. You need to leave,’” Hoga told Channel 2.
Investigators found the Masons living less than a mile away in another home they did not own. They said the men had claimed ownership of several abandoned homes.
“They would claim these homes, but instead of living in them themselves, they would find people to put in there, and all the while they are taking our money,” Hoga said.
But though Hoga family members are out thousands of dollars they had paid to the Masons, they’re thankful that in the end, they did not have to move.
“Luckily enough, we’re blessed that the true owner was willing to work for us, so we’re still in the home,” he said.
The Masons, meanwhile, have been arrested and each charged with burglary, criminal damage to property, theft by deception and theft by taking, according to the Cobb County Sheriff’s Office. Roger Mason, 53, has been assigned bonds totaling $45,000, and Taylor Mason, 19, a $10,000 bond.
Another Cobb County Jail inmate, John Eugene Harris, has been charged with theft by deception and forgery for having allegedly executed at least 19 fraudulent leases for homes he did not own.
The 44-year-old Smyrna man is accused of having acted through his company, New Life Granted, as leasing agent for the vacant residences.
Harris has been active in seven counties, allegedly breaking into homes, changing the locks and leasing the dwellings to unsuspecting families – collecting thousands of dollars in security deposits and rents that don’t rightfully belong to him, Channel 2 reported.
Cobb County police say Harris could have had hundreds of victims in at least seven counties. Harris is being held on $200,000 bond.
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