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Another Buchanan Auto Dealership Has Been Sued
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Published: August 22, 2008
NEW PORT RICHEY - Lawsuits continue to pile up against car dealerships owned by U.S. Rep. Vern Buchanan.
The latest suit was filed 10 days ago against Buchanan's Pasco County holding, Suncoast Ford Mitsubishi, on U.S. 19 in Port Richey. In the lawsuit, former employee Scott Russ says managers and owners at the dealership attempted to force him to engage in illegal practices and then fired him when he refused.
Russ alleges that in his two years working as finance and insurance director he witnessed numerous illegal practices, including:
Powerbooking, or falsely reporting accessories on a vehicle to lenders to qualify the vehicle for a higher loan;
Falsifying buyers' income information and tax returns to qualify them for loans;
Charging customers for after-market additions without disclosing the presence of the additions.
Sally Tibbetts, a spokeswoman for Buchanan's re-election campaign, denied the allegations, saying Buchanan is a silent partner and not involved in the daily operation of the dealership.
Darrin Chrisman, a managing partner of Sarasota Ford and spokesman for the congressman's five dealerships, echoed Tibbetts, saying he hasn't seen Buchanan at his dealership in more than a year.
Russ' attorney, Douglas Lyons, isn't buying it.
"He's a lot more involved than he wants the world to know," Lyons said. "First of all, he runs for office saying he's not a politician, that he's a businessman. Now he says, 'I'm a congressman, and I don't know what is going on at the dealerships,' because it's in his interest not to know what's going on."
Russ could not be reached for comment.
Lyons represents a group of former employees and consumers who have filed lawsuits against the Sarasota dealerships. The allegations of those suits are similar to Russ', and at least one of those plaintiffs has said he was pressured to give money to Buchanan's 2006 election campaign.
Buchanan has denied those allegations.
Lyons is realistic about his clients' chances. He said almost all of them unknowingly signed contracts that included arbitration agreements. Those agreements usually put claims in front of unfriendly arbitrators in closed-door hearings instead of before unbiased judges in open court, he said.
Lyons gave his clients a 10 percent chance of avoiding arbitration, saying they would "get crushed" if they wound up there instead of court.
"If you started paying attention to the fine print on everything you sign, [you would notice that] nine times out of 10 you give up your right to a jury trial without even knowing it," Lyons said. "The more the people that are offending don't want anyone to know what they're doing, the more you're going to have the arbitration agreement."
Buchanan, a Sarasota Republican now seeking his second term in Congress, once owned 22 dealerships, Chrisman said. He has sold all but five: the Port Richey dealership, two in Sarasota County, one in Melbourne and another in Elizabeth City, N.C., Chrisman said.
Buchanan, 57, represents the state's 13th Congressional District, which encompasses all or part of DeSoto, Hardee, Manatee and Sarasota counties. He won the seat in 2006 by narrowly defeating Democrat Christine Jennings.
Jennings and Buchanan now are locked in a rematch.
Reporter Todd Leskanic can be reached at (727) 815-1084 or tleskanic@tampatrib.com.
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