When Justin Mayer traded in his 2007 Ford F-150 for a newer Dodge truck from the California Dodge Chrysler Jeep dealership in Lompoc last year, he thought it was a simple transaction.

One year later, however, the dealership is out of business, the dealership owners are gone, and life is far from simple for Mayer.

"I am being sued by Ford. Chrysler is making money on a vehicle they didn't pay a dime for. The new owners are being forced to make payments, but they cannot legally drive the vehicle because it's still registered to me."

Attempts to contact Timothy L. and Shawna S. Costa for this story were unsuccessful.

Mayer and at least a half-dozen other individuals who bought or sold vehicles to the dealership in the weeks before it closed are left in a consumer nightmare, with little help from the law.

Deputy District Attorney Mag Nicola in Santa Maria said he recently reviewed the possibility of a criminal case against the Costas, but decided not to prosecute them for failure to pay certain checks. He said the couple's filing of bankruptcy earlier this year played an important part in the decision not to file charges.

"If accounts are seized, it makes it hard to prove intent and we didn't have enough information to point us one way or the other," Nicola said.

The dealership was closed in August 2008 by Chrysler Financial.

Court documents confirm that the Costas filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in March.

Mayer and other former California Dodge Chrysler Jeep customers, like Stephen Bradford, Gary Hirzel, all share similar stories - of trading in a vehicle a few weeks before the dealer was closed, only to find out months later that the business did not properly pay off the loans on the trade-in vehicles.

"They promised to pay me the difference on my trade-in," Bradford said, adding that the check bounced when he tried to cash it.

After the dealership closed, he found out both the old loan, and the registration on the truck were still under his name.

At the time of the closure, the Costas had said in an interview - and told customers including Mayer - that the sudden dealership closure by Chrysler Financial was the cause behind the loan confusion.

A spokesperson for Chrysler Financial said the company was unable to discuss the particulars of any dealer situation, but said even if vehicles are seized, vehicle loans remain the responsibility of the dealer.

In Mayer's case, he moved out of state and did not know something had gone wrong with the deal until months later when a Ford financial institution informed him that they were suing him for defaulting on his trade-in loan.

Mayer managed to hunt down his car, which he says was actually sold to one of the Costas' employees.

"She was given a 100 percent financing through Chrysler Financial, but she found out later that it's still registered under my name, so she's paying for a car she's not supposed to be driving," Mayer said.

Looking for answers, Mayer found Tim Costa working at a Toyota dealer in Fairfield, Calif. Talking over the phone, Mayer said Costa insinuated that Chrysler Financial was solely responsible for both the vehicle and the loan situation, but that he would try to help.

"I called back a few weeks later, and they told me he wasn't working there anymore," Mayer said.

Out of the six former customers of the Costas contacted for this story, only Hirzel said he had managed to set things straight, though it took him two months and multiple phone calls.

"That was a mess. I had to fight tooth and nail to get the car paid off," Hirzel said.

By luck, Hirzel's trade-in car had been sold to a wholesaler before Chrysler Financial had shut the dealership down. The wholesaler had then sold the car to Toyota of Santa Maria.

Once the wholesaler knew the history of the vehicle, he was then responsible to pay off the $16,000 loan that should have been handled by the dealership.

"He basically had to buy it twice," Hirzel said.

The California Department of Motor Vehicles is investigating cases related to the dealership, but Public Information Officer Armando Botello said so far the only action he knew of that the DMV has taken was to give the report to Nicola at the District Attorney's office.

"But the same findings the DMV sends to the district attorneys, they can take to our own legal department," Botello said, adding that the legal department may be able to give some former dealership customers some relief through civil court.

"They should contact us, or hire an attorney," Botello said.

Nicola had similar advice for customers still in financial difficulty thanks to the dealership's closure.

"They should probably seek civil law council."

"Which is surprising," Hirzel said, "that there's not more protection for people when this happens."

November 3, 2009