Thursday, January 9, 2020

Baby Lane Blames Papa Lane

Judge awards $1,238,500 default judgment to Lakebend. 

Thanksgiving Dinner will never be the same at the Lane household after David W. Lane blamed the whole Ridgway Lane scandal on his father in court Tuesday.


The Lakebend Homeowners Association sued Ridgway Lane as well as David L. Lane and David W. Lane in Rankin County Circuit Court in November (W is the son of L.).  Ridgway Lane manages homeowners associations.  David L. Lane and David W. Lane are the President and Vice-President of the company.  Eleven  homeowners associations sued Ridgway and the Lanes in Rankin County Circuit Court, alleging the defendants embezzled over two million dollars from accounts they managed for the HOA's. A list of the lawsuits and alleged embezzled amounts is posted below. The HOA's accuse the defendants of embezzling over $2.3 million from their accounts.  The lawsuits charge the defendants with breach of contract, conversion, unjust enrichment, negligence, civil theft, and breach of fiduciary duty.

The Lakebend Homeowners Association sued  the defendants on November 14, 2019.  None of the defendants filed an answer to the complaint.  Lakebend moved for a default judgment on December 17.  Judge Dewey Arthur granted the motion and awarded a default judgment of $235,000 to Lakebend on December 20.  The Court also slapped Ridgway & the Lanes with a million dollars  in punitive damages as well as attorney's fees of $3,500 (Michael, you're cheap.).  Total judgment: $1,238,500. Game, set, Match Lakebend.


Answers and motions to reconsider started popping up on the docket over the next few days.  David W. Lane claimed his lawyer, Michael Malouf, spoke to Lakebend's lawyer before the default was entered.  He also claimed to have a defense (covered later in this post).  David L. Lane complained he was unable to respond to the complaint because he had "serious and permanent medical problems that have affected his memory and judgment at times."  Papa Lane claims he has a "colorable defense" as well.   He is represented by attorney Merrida Coxwell.

Baby Lane blamed everything on his father in his motion to set aside the default judgment:

Admittedly a phone call was had between counsel, during which time Counsel for David W. Lane, (the son) did express that his client claims to have had no knowledge of the massive scheme to steal from this Plaintiff, or from others, but rather that the theft was committed by David L. Lane, (the father), and that David L. Lane would be accepting responsibility for his terrible betrayal of the trust that so many had placed in him....

Lakebend replied and said yes, the opposing counsels discussed the case but the issue of default was never mentioned nor did the lawyers show any "intent" to represent the defendants.  The HOA  said the defendants were just trying to delay the invevitable:

Where David L Lane, (the father), and Ridgeway Lane & Associates’ only possible reason to attempt to set aside the Judgment is to delay recovery of funds belonging to the Plaintiffs,  which are surely being spent to further support the country club life style of David L. Lane, it  will operate continuing and extreme prejudice to set aside the default judgment....
Baby Lane's claim is somewhat at odds with what Lakebend said about Papa Lane in the complaint:

 On Tuesday, November 12, 2019, William Burkard went to the offices of the Defendant and spoke directly with David (W.) Lane. Mr. Burkard asked "Are the bank accounts going to match the monthly reports", to which Mr. Lane replied "No". William Burkard asked "how much will they be off?" Mr. Lane repsonded "I don't know", then Mr. Lane confessed "I let alot of people down."....


The Lanes are accused of embezzling from the following HOA's:

Bridgewater 2: $343,938
Bridgewater: Over 500,000
Dinsmor: $217,782
Barrington: Hundreds of thousands of dollars (An estimate of $200,000 will be used in the total as a minimum).
Bruenburg: $188,330
Oakhurst:  $168,000
Diplomat: $28,000
Palisades: $87,000
Eastbrooke: Over $500,000
Timbers: Over $90,000
Wrenfield: $9,000



Earlier Ridgway Lane posts
Bruenburg Discovers More Missing Funds 
Injunctions issued against Ridgway Lane & the Lanes.  
Contempt for Lanes?
Ridgway Lane Update: Timber! 
Lane responds.
Eastbrooke: Lanes stole over $500,000.  
Oakhurst sues Ridgway Lane 
Payroll company sues Ridgway lane 
Ridgeway Lane Update, TRO's Extended  (Lynch Mob Edition)
Bruenburg Sues Ridgway Lane 
St. Ives Escapes 
Add Stonebridge to Ridgway Lane List 
King Kenny Rulz, Bridgewaters get freeze.  
Lawsuit: Lane Confessed 
Dinsmor losses over $200,000 
On deck: Bruenberg 
Up next: The Barrington.  
Bridgewater goes for freeze, Bridgewater at Old Agency says RL embezzled over $340,000 
Palisades plundered.  
Dinsmor HOA discoveres "irregularitites."  
Bridgewater accuses HOA manager of embezzlement. 






28 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is it "Ridgway" or "Ridgeway"
Noticed in the court document it is spelled both ways. ?

Anonymous said...

I certainly don’t know but would guess either
1. Dad has a serious perhaps fatal illness so is taking the hit for his son
2. Son is a total scumbag and is throwing his Dad under the bus

Anonymous said...

11:47, or Dad is the scumbag and seriously f*cked his kid. That's still an option on the table, right?

Anonymous said...

12:01. Good point. I should have had that as option #3

Anonymous said...

It will be easy to determine who was in on the scheme... follow their finances. Junior can’t claim ignorance while purchasing WAY beyond his W-2...

Anonymous said...

It's my understanding that RL has had issues over the years making payroll. Employees were paid by third party payroll company who would have to recoup it from RL after the fact.

Anonymous said...

@1:01- The only companies I know that utilize this type of service are those that got their asses handed to them by IRS because they weren’t competent enough to process payroll and pay required taxes. It’s a service provided at a premium. It doesn’t make much sense for a struggling company. Seems they’d be wiser to reallocate positions to allot for a competent payroll employee. Payroll and taxes are not rocket science!

Anonymous said...

Yes word on the street was Dad was going to try and take the fall for this.
I bet Junior knew a lot more than he is saying

Anonymous said...

So the allegation is that the son didn know nuffin?

No way no how could a smart guy have had a clue something might be wrong?


ALL RIGHTY THEN!

Louis LeFleur said...

11:42, it should be Ridgway, without the "e", as in Richard. Fortunately, Richard's name has not been brought into this because he had nothing to do with it, hasn't been involved in the business since long before these problems started.

Anonymous said...

I still say there is a woman behind all this-

Anonymous said...

Kind of like the Walker's.

Anonymous said...

You know the old adage. “The Apple don!t (sic) fall far from the tree!”

Anonymous said...

2:19 PM

Hey Richard! Your time is coming.

Macy Hanson said...

Michael Wolf, who is a very good lawyer and a good guy, better start executing on this judgment like there is no tomorrow. I doubt that there are enough recoverable assets to come close to covering this judgment, let alone covering the (very likely) forthcoming judgments. Those HOAs that purchased fidelity bonds are going to be glad they paid that premium.

No fidelity bond coverage = good luck collecting.

Food for thought: what if Lakebend somehow collects on this judgment, over and beyond the amount of actual damages suffered by it? And what if that recovery comes at the expense of other victimized-HOAs NOT being to collect on their future judgments, if any, for actual damages lost? This is a race and a receiver of some sort should have been appointed for this reason.

Anonymous said...

Let's see..

Ah, yes a trip to the Federal Building and bankruptcy filings are in the future.

Anonymous said...

Timing wise, is it possible they invested the escrow accounts in the Lamar Adams Scam and this is where they blew up or did they just spend it? 13% would have been awfully tempting off those accounts.

Anonymous said...

Louis LeFleur is right. Ridgeway may have his faults but he is clean on this matter.

Anonymous said...

Where did the previous twenty posters get their legal training? Please clarify. Thanks.

Anonymous said...

Default won’t stand.

Wolf knew about defense intent...

Bad lawyering.

But he did make more work for....himself.

So he can bill to lose this issue.....



Anonymous said...

Aside from being rich and white, can someone explain to me how these two have not been arrested yet?

Anonymous said...

I agree with Macy Hanson that this is now a race. I really expected all of the HOA actions to be consolidated, with a case management order controlling discovery and setting pre-trial procedure/deadlines for all parties.

5:06, I'm not a bankruptcy lawyer, but I don't think a judgment based on fraud is automatically dischargeable in a personal bankruptcy.

Anonymous said...

Fear not 9:44, it’s coming.

Anonymous said...

9:44. Prosecutors are slow to act, if ever, if the dispute is being pursued with a civil claim. Wealth and race are irrelevant.

Anonymous said...

Just like with the Lamar Adams scam and the various parties involved there, these small-time scams/schemes/thievery don't often leave large pots of money from which to recover. Most of the time, those on the receiving end of funds are taking the funds to fund a "lifestyle" (be it status-symbol purchases, travel, drugs and gambling, and.or just overall "living large") not to be otherwise responsible investors and savers. The other people's money goes out as fast as it is taken from them.

I'm not sure about those comments regarding Lane investing with Adams, but assuming they have the slightest basis, again, the money is long gone - stolen by a thief and giving to another thief and hoping that Mills can eventually recover some percentage from parties that likely don't have it anymore either isn't an encouraging outlook.

The bottom line is that judgments against Lane could easily wind up being not worth the price of obtaining them.

Macy Hanson said...

@10:53

That is why any recovery against the Lanes will likely have to come from sureties; this is the whole point of requiring third-parties, like the Lanes, who handle other people's money to post such bonds as security from misuse or those funds.

Likewise, any meaningful recovery, if any, in the Lamar Adams timber Ponzi scheme will come from third parties: Baker Donelson, Butler Snow, and Trustmark, etc. I would be willing to wager that Allyson Mills obtains significant recovery (nine figures) from the third-parties in the SEC civil lawsuit.

Anonymous said...

Richard Ridgeway knew about what was going on. My HOA found 2 deposits (over $40,000.00) Richard Ridgeway made into our account back in 2004. We were having an audit completed and he knew the audit would discover the missing money.

Anonymous said...

Any update on this Kingfish



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