Prodigy issues verification

[navyflyer72]

I have been in comms with the moderators both here and at Lateral-G.net. I was given permission to post again in order to clear my name. Although I feel I deserve a public apology for the final post that all but calls me a liar in the last Prodigy posting. That post had 10,000 views in roughly three to four weeks, so its a shame that a victims integrity would be called into question in the final post and the thread locked. Especially for the reasons I found out this happened.

So what follows is the truth as far as I can tell. I can only tell you what I have firsthand knowledge. Anything I relate that I got secondhand will be annotated as such.

I was told that someone had called the moderators and claimed that my story was incomplete or flat out false. No one ever called me to verify these claims or get my side of the story, my threads were just deleted or locked then deleted later.

I was told that this person was Michael Serafine, Franks son, who was also the President and manager of prodigy (per the publically available court documents).

I was told that Michael made a number of claims regarding my post, like, I had missed several payments, Frank had to put my Camaro into storage because I was missing payments or taking too long and my wife tried to sell my Camaro while I was deployed. These were the claims that I was told about.

This call was enough to prompt the moderator of lateral-g.net to take down a support thread and post a one line thread explaining that information had come to light that needed to be verified before the post would be returned to the forum. Here on PT.com the thread was locked with a final post from a moderator that makes me look like a liar.

I stayed up last night until 4 am, forwarding over 30 emails and email chains to garickman (who is a retired disabled-in-the-line-of-duty Police Officer) to review the communications between me and my wife and Frank and Lisa at Prodigy over the 5 years my car was in Franks possession.

I had over 104 emails in my email between me and Frank. 69 of those were initiated by me, 28 were initiated by Frank, 7 were from my wife to Frank. As you can see, most of my emails were not responded to.

The rough timeline looks like this:

Dec 2008 first contact with Frank regarding taking on my car for mods

18 Jan 2008 Frank picks up my Camaro from Maryland and takes it to Fl and $500 (rough date)

4 Apr 2008 Frank receives $4800 credit card payment

5 Apr 2008 Frank receives $3800 credit card payment

7 Apr 2008 Frank sells wheels/tires/rear, engine and subframe off my car and gets $7367 in cash these are parts that were sold on PT.com, and you can read this in my build thread in my posts around Feb-Apr of 2008 as I sold many parts to forum members, I will include a price breakdown later in this post when I show the rest of the money.

18 Apr 2008 Frank emails that he is starting work on my Camaro, he had it since Jan, but he told me then it would be a while until he could get it in to the shop due to other builds and lack of space.

21Apr2008 Frank sends a 2 page invoice and that shows parts bought (totaling $23,927.30) and money received to date totaling $16,467.


I am deployed this time and the Navy had screwed up my pay. I hadn't been paid in two months and a bonus I was expecting was late. My wife (despite being angry that I told her that the Prodigy work would only be around $10k) was coordinating the work on my behalf in my absence. I have sent her emails to garickman. She explained the pay situation with Frank and she had a plan to get him paid off for what was owed still and Frank was good with the plan.

between the end of April and June she sent Frank a $2500 payment

2Jul2008 My wife sent Frank the final payment of $7000 credit card payment

as of 2Jul2008 Frank had $25,967 in cash. The parts had been $23,927, there was $2000 paid towards the labor already completed.

Frank had estimated $6000 for labor (he was charging me $50/hr which he said was his rate for military) and I had paid $2000 of that at this point. based upon what I picked up last week, 90% of this labor never happened.

In 2008 Frank sent me 10 emails

In 2009 Frank sent me 5 emails

In 2010 Frank sent me 6 emails

In 2011 Frank sent me 1 email (I originally thought this was zero, but I found one email in another account)

In 2012 Frank sent me 3 emails

In 2013 Frank sent me 5 emails, they were all in the last three weeks coordinating for me to pick up what was left of my Camaro.

I will attach to this post a picture of the two page invoice that Frank sent on 21Apr2008, my credit card and debit card statements showing payments on the above listed dates of the above listed amounts to GPSUPERSTORE, which was Prodigy's parts charge name.

In the years that followed I received one Frank initiated email. Every other bit of communication was initiated by me. Most of those were not responded to. I grew increasingly frustrated as the years passed and the excuses continued and the deadlines proposed by Frank came and went without a call or email. I would email him and he would not reply and when he finally would reply he had another (usually compelling and seemingly true) excuse, that I would buy and give him slack. He was a con artist.

This is not new for the Serafines. This is a pattern. For instance, James Frank Serafine- Franks father, was charged and found guilty in 1987 for a similar scam building Mustangs- Frank was a scam artist as well. He was talented and engaging and had a big personality, but he was a liar. He built amazing cars, big name cars, SEMA cars, cars for Shaq, he ensured people whose opinions in the community never had delays with him (moderators on these sites have posted that they never had any delays with parts purchased through Prodigy). These are tactics of a con artist. Look at Bernie Madoff, he was a Ponzi scheme con artist, but he made millionaires in the process, because they spread the word and got him more business. Frank got the word out by building big name cars off the backs of the regular joe's he was screwing over to the tune of several hundred thousand dollars.

If Frank isn't a scam artist, then he should return the money or the parts that were paid for, period.

Guys like Hard2Core and I essentially lost $100k or more each. Hard2Core sent Frank a '69 Camaro and $100k, he got back some parts and a shell of a '69 Camaro. I sent Frank a finished '67 Camaro PT machine that I had spent around $100k on over 7 years (bought her in Nov 2001 - Frank picked her up Jan 2008). Let me list out the parts Frank has on the invoice that the invoice says he purchased, and let me tell you what I received from that list:

This is on the invoice I will attach from 21Apr2008:
$6400 Forgeline wheels/tires
$6400 DSE hydroformed subframe/w coilovers, rack&pinion and swaybar
$379 DSE minitube
$175 DSE through body weld-in subframe connectors
$660 DSE billet hood hinges
$1600 G Bar rear suspension
$2500 Moser 12 bolt (shortened)
$3500 Wilwood brake kit
$1900 TKO600
$276 shipping for wheels/tires
$16.50 shipping for shocks
$120 press off axel bearings for brake brackets and new bearings

Total - $23,927 (this is on front age of invoice) of this $23,514.50 is for parts.

Here is what I received from that list:

mini tubs and SFC's, totaling $554. So I am missing $22,960.50 in brand new parts! Where are they? In their place is the rusted junkyard running gear from a mid-60's car. Rusted 10 bolt, rusted leaf springs, Rusted spindles and springs up front, rusted partial drum brakes, steel wheels with two lug nuts each. No shocks front or rear.

Parts that are just plain missing off my Camaro that were never supposed to be sold (this is an incomplete list as I am not done going over the car, I am sure this list will grow)

Aluminum Be Cool radiator and fans
drive shaft
aluminum spindles
hotchkis subframe connectors ( these were to be removed, but returned to me)
headers that I had bought with the 383 Engine from Texas
most of my accessories, though some of these may be sitting inside my Camaro, but I haven't had time to get inside, since the lock knobs were removed and the doors locked and I didn't receive the keys to my car. That's right, I didn't even get the keys to my car!

All of these parts were never to be sold off and I don't have them. This is roughly $3000-4000 in parts, simply gone.