ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, April 6, 1996 TAG: 9604080016
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
A FORMER INMATE who claimed at one point to be worth $66 million launched his sting with a $10 cashier's check.
From a state prison cell in Staunton, David K. Sadler set up a multimillion-dollar counterfeiting scam to buy real estate and arranged the purchase of two Rolls-Royces.
After his release, Sadler put his counterfeiting scheme in motion. But then the 41-year-old con man got drunk, wrecked the Rolls and was tracked down the next day in Appomattox.
``Rolls-Royce?'' U.S. District Judge Samuel Wilson asked incredulously, his eyebrows arching as a prosecutor described the defendant's exploits.
Sadler pleaded guilty Thursday to counterfeiting cashier's checks to buy the luxury cars, and a prosecutor said he likely will be sentenced to four or five years in federal prison.
One check for $714 bought a plane ticket to Atlanta. There, he used four more checks to buy a 1995 Rolls-Royce Silver Spur and a 1993 Rolls-Royce Corniche convertible for $369,900.
``When Sadler was in prison, he was calling up the regional manager for Rolls-Royce setting up this deal,'' Assistant U.S. Attorney Tom Bondurant said. ``He laid the groundwork for this when he was still incarcerated.''
Sadler, who was serving a three-year sentence for grand larceny in Fairfax County, also negotiated real estate deals that never closed, including the planned purchase of an elegant Georgetown mansion for $2.2 million.
He claimed to be worth $66 million, with homes in Monaco and Palm Beach, Fla., when he was behind bars in Staunton. He said he had no assets and no income in asking for a court-appointed lawyer in December.
When Sadler was released in September, he went to live with Harry M. Ranson, the brother of a prison guard he had befriended, in the small home in Appomattox that Ranson shares with his mother, Bondurant said.
Sadler entranced Ranson with grandiose plans for developing a financial management company, and the men began setting up a business, buying office equipment with Ranson's money and credit, Bondurant said.
Sadler had Ranson buy a $10 cashier's check, which he altered and copied into 500 blank checks he said would be used as an advertising promotion, Bondurant said.
Instead, Sadler used a check imprinting machine and began cashing the bogus checks.
Sadler told Ranson they needed company cars, and the two men flew to Atlanta on Sept. 23, driving away from the Rolls-Royce dealership in the two immaculate luxury cars.
It wasn't until they were long gone that the car salesman noticed the four cashier's checks totaling $369,900 all had the same check numbers, Bondurant said.
``David can be very charismatic,'' his attorney, Killis T. Howard, said. ``He has enough apparent detail to make it all credible.''
Driving home, Sadler wrecked the Corniche convertible in the median of Interstate 85 in North Carolina and was arrested on several charges, including driving under the influence. Bondurant said a vodka bottle was found on the floorboard.
Ranson bailed him out of jail, and the two returned to Appomattox in the Silver Spur.
FBI agents, alerted by the chagrined Rolls salesman, arrested Sadler the next day at Ranson's $35,000 house, where FBI agents confiscated the $180,000 car, Bondurant said.
Bondurant marveled at his moxie.
``He's a great con man,'' the prosecutor said. ``He's risen to the top of his field.''
LENGTH: Medium: 71 linesby CNB