From the Clarion Ledger (Jackson, MS) Law Enforcement Briefs:
harrison County
Police arrest 3 in Katrina fraud
In the last week, three people were arrested in fraudulent Hurricane Katrina-related home repair cases, according to the state attorney general's office.
William Guy Revel, 38, of Tennessee, arrested Thursday, faces charges of felony home repair fraud and contracting without a license. Revel has been in custody in Tennessee since September 2007 on unrelated charges, according to a statement from the attorney general's office.
Upon his release, Revel was taken to the Harrison County Adult Detention Center, where he is being held on $26,000 bond.
U.S. marshals arrested Patrick Michael Serge, 47, and his wife, Luanne Edwards Serge, 40, of Flat Rock, Ala., on Jan. 18 and charged them each with four counts of felony home repair fraud. According to the statement, the charges are a result of "numerous complaints" from early September 2007 of a contractor doing business as Central Development Group collecting money to start jobs and then leaving town.
Patrick Serge also faces grand larceny charges from the Harrison County Sheriff's Department and the Long Beach Police Department.
I have heard that the Attorney General's office is going to recommend a $150K bond for Pat, and a $100K bond for Luanne.
Roofing Update: It's still raining in the house - getting a roof on is a huge priority. And typical for our project, it is taking us forever. Part of the problem is that we saw some new shingles in a display at Lowes while we were in Texas for Christmas - these shingles are rated for 130 mph winds and are warrantied for 40 years. Well, Lowes had these shingles for $100/square (a square is 100 sq ft), but it would take up to 6 weeks to get them in. Our first quote was for $200/square installed, and they would provide the shingles (4 to 6 weeks). Then we had installation quotes for $30-$50/square. The only roofer to actually go on the roof advised us that the tar paper installation was terrible (gee, guess that's why it rains inside the house) - actually, we knew that the valleys needed to be redone, but this guy said that the rest of it was bad too. We are still waiting on his quote.
I called all around town, and even to Louisiana, and nobody had these new shingles in stock. You would think they'd be the preferred shingle in a hurricane prone region. Finally, one of the $35/square roofers found a local supplier who had the shingles in stock for $65/square. So we bought the shingles on Friday, and we went ahead and bought new "tar paper" to reroof the house. This tar paper is a woven fabric in some sort of plastic - it's very thin and is much lighter than tar paper, but it is untearable. So that'll be another $800 materials and labor to re-paper the roof.
With all of the rain we have been getting, we are concerned that the valleys will not be dried out enough to put the new roof on. We have a short break in the rain - no rain until Tuesday. Hopefully that'll give the roof enough time to dry out since the roofer is coming out on Tuesday. It would be great if they can get the tar paper installed on Tuesday, before Wednesday's big rain, which is to be followed by more rain through Sunday.
Here's the roof color - it's Owens Corning Driftwood. We wanted Estate Gray, but the Driftwood will match the siding green and the browns in the stucco better. The Estate Gray is below the Driftwood (this is a project house on the Owens Corning website):
