Christopher Babcock
Rolex watches, diamond jewelry, limousines, a new Mercedes Benz and even a new home — by all appearances, 43-year-old Christopher Babcock of Estero was living the high life last summer.
The problem, according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, was that he couldn’t afford any of it.
For at least three months last summer, authorities say Babcock went on a spending spree, writing more than $500,000 worth of bad checks for a variety of high-end items from Michigan to Naples with money that he never had.
In mid-February, Babcock’s luck ran out when he was arrested in Bloomfield, Mich. He was extradited to Florida last Friday where he was charged with six counts of grand theft and one count of scheming to defraud, the FDLE reported. Babcock, whose last known address is listed as 10741 Vivaldi Court, No. 1101, is currently being held in the Lee County jail.
“He was really good at the lies he was telling,” FDLE spokeswoman Kristen Chernosky said. “The businesses he was dealing with believed what he told them.”
Babcock’s spree of deceit began on July 16, 2009, when authorities say he opened a checking account with JP Morgan Chase Bank in Fort Myers. He didn’t have any money, but told bank officials that he was inheriting $3.1 million, reports said.
“He got eight starter checks,” Chernosky said. “That same day, he wrote two checks. One for a little over $1,000 for automobile insurance. The second was for $350,000 written to Access Realty as a deposit on a new home.”
The next day, Babcock wrote two more bad checks — one for more than $113,000 to Mercedes Benz of Naples for a new Mercedes SL 550, the other for about $1,000 for auto insurance on the Mercedes, the FDLE reported.
Mercedes Benz of Naples declined to comment.
On July 20, authorities say Babcock walked into Greenstone’s Fine Jewelry in Birmingham, Mich., to purchase an $8,000 men’s Rolex watch, a $6,500 women’s Rolex, and a $19,700 two-karat diamond engagement ring. However, Chernosky said that before Babcock finished the purchase, he decided to upgrade the ring to a three-karat diamond.
When the store informed him it would take a couple weeks to get the bigger stone, Chernosky said Babcock agreed to pay his $51,000 bill when the ring was ready, and walked out with the Rolexes.
“In the meantime, what he did was he sold the Rolex watch in Bonita Springs to a pawn shop for $3,500,” Chernosky said. “Then he sold the women’s Rolex watch for $1,500.”
In early September, authorities say Babcock conned the Michigan jewelry store to wire him an additional $3,000 “to assist his fiancee with an urgent matter,” which they added to his bill, Chernosky said. When Babcock eventually wrote a $54,000 check to the store, it bounced.
“We have no comment,” a Greenstone’s manager said, before hanging up on Monday.
Authorities say Babcock didn’t stop there.
At the end of August, he wrote a bogus check for about $6,400 to Cape Harbor Vacation Rentals in Cape Coral to cover a rental unit for a month, Chernosky said. In mid-September, authorities say Babcock wrote a bad $7,500 check to a Fort Myers limousine company for 13 limo rentals, and at the end of September he wrote a bum check for $3,000 to the Southseas Island Resort on Captiva Island for a two-day stay.
“That was written from an account that had been closed since December 2006,” Chernosky said.
Carolyn Hudson, a spokeswoman for the resort, said that Babcock’s credit card was denied upon check-in. Instead, he wrote a check, which the resort verified through a third-party check verification company.
After his check bounced, the resort contacted Babcock.
“He said, ‘No problem, I will get that to you in a timely manner,’” Hudson said. “He never came back to us. Repeated attempts to reach him, we were not able to.”
The resort filed a complaint with the Lee County Sheriff’s Office in December.
“We did our due diligence,” Hudson said. “It is rare. Most people provide us their credit card. In this case, we took a check that was verified by our check verification company.”
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Connect with Ryan Mills at www.naplesnews.com/staff/ryan-mills
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Comments » 1
smay writes:
This guy bought a limousine from the company that I worked for. I was the southeast sales manager for a limousine manufacturer. he bought the limousine and then the check bounced. It took me three months to get the car back. I should have called the police and maybe this could have been avoided.
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