Rob_Wolchek's Blog

In case you didn't see it on-air, check out the highlights from time playing with the Washington Generals:

A couple of months ago, I did a story about Tamika Mosley. I said she was a crooked caregiver who took money from her sick, elderly patient and lied to her probation officer about not having a job so she wouldn't have to pay back the victims of an old felony crime she'd been convicted of.  Well, Tamika was brought before a judge and rather than just plead guilty, she and her lawyer dragged it out over a period of months and dragged everyone involved in my story into court.  It was her right.

The result:  the judge ruled Tamika was a crooked caregiver who took money from her sick, elderly patient and lied to her probation officer about not having a job so she wouldn't have to pay back the victims of an old felony crime she'd been convicted of!

So, Tamika's most likely headed to the pokey.  Now, if we could just figure out how to get the state to do background checks on their 'caregivers' so this won't happen again.  Ridiculous!

After three years of meetings with lawmakers, lawyers and lobbyists....it's finally happened!  New laws to protect us against bad builders and shady contractors.

Governor Granholm signed the bills today and had very kind words to say to me and to our viewers who told their stories which inspired our lawmakers to get to work. 

I am very proud.  Fox 2 viewers, we did it!  We worked together to get something done!

Thank you.

Today he's on the web...last week he was in the Hall of Shame!  Imagine my surprise when I discovered Frankie Blue, the big shot broker who had his investors put their money into businesses that are now suspected of being totally bogus, showed up on the web with a new name and a new 'stock picking' business. 

Can't say I'd trust the "hot picks" of a guy who seems to have lost his business, his credibility, many of his friends and certainly a lot of people's money.  I guess maybe Frank Bluestein is just wired differently than me.

 

Frank Bluestein was the kind of investment broker everyone would want.  He had the tips and tricks that would make his clients bundles of profit...profit his clients told me he encouraged them to re-invest in the 'special' deals he was offering.

Then, the deals fell apart leaving his investors broke. 

Have you had any dealings with Frank Bluestein or another broker who lead you down a road that left you broke?  And, what should happen to someone who steers you into investments that collapse?

 

You know, I've never been one who complains a lot about paying taxes.   If the money is going to help someone in need, fix up the roads or make our schools better, I guess I don't really mind that much.  HOWEVER, finding out that someone at the state is such a knucklehead that they'd shell out money to a convicted felon on probation to take care of a senior citizen makes me pretty angry.  So, our tax money is going to pay for this crooked caregiver's probation monitoring and at the same time, it's going to fund her work with the elderly!   And the lady from the state says they don't have the resources to do background checks on these people!  That's the lamest excuse I've heard in awhile.

What do you think?

 

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I just spent the day in Lansing dealing with a bunch of B.S.! For years, I've been working with some decent, caring Democrats and Republicans in the Senate trying to get some new laws on the books that would punish rotten and unlicensed contractors, guys who get in trouble, close shop and start up under new names. These crooks not only hurt consumers, they are also the ones who underbid legitimate contractors that give realistic estimates on your home projects... taking business away from them.

So, last year we almost got a package of bills passed that would really help. The Senate passed the bills. The House passed the bills. The Governor vetoed them saying they needed a few fixes.

The fixes have been made. The package once again passed the Senate. Now, there are some knuckleheads in the House that want to spend more time going over the bills. And guess what? Some of these guys voted in favor of the same bills last year!

Let's get these bills passed! Are you with me?

I've done stories about fake Gucci handbags and phony Rolex watches...I've seen knockoff Nike sneakers, listened to imitation JBL speakers and sniffed Calvin Klein perfume that was really Calvin Clone perfume!  Now, I've seen it all.  A fake Taylor Made golf club!  I put the guy who sold it in the Hall of Shame.

Have you ever bought a fake?  If so, what was it and how was it?

One weekend long ago, my old roomate came home with a tattoo on his chest.  It was the Playboy Bunny head!  Why'd he get it?  Well, needless to say, he was a bit 'out of sorts' at the time (a polite way of saying drunk) and Hef's Bunny was the only one he could afford.  Boy, did he ever regret it!

He would hang around the pool wearing a shirt, went to the beach with a towel draped around him at all times to cover the bunny.  He couldn't even wear a tank top because of the idiotic location and size of the rabbit head.  His girlfriends thought it was sexist.  His buddies thought it was hilarious. 

I recently put a tattoo fading product to the Fame or Shame test.  I gotta think this thing's selling like hotcakes (even though our tester didn't think the kit worked). 

Do you have a goofy tattoo story?  Wake up with someone's name inked on your rump?  Come back from Mexico with a Corona bottle tattooed on your arm?       Tell me about your crazy tattoo.  C'mon, I know you're wearing that long-sleeved shirt on a hot day for a reason!   Let it out here and tell me about that tat!

It's likely you've opened your inbox to find a mysterious e-mail from some oil executive who's looking for a trusting person to help him move 50-million dollars out of his corrupt African country and wants to deposit it into your bank account.  Maybe you've  been inforned that someone with your last name died in a car crash and the overworked official needs to find an heir to this person and get rid of the paperwork on his desk and the money by giving it to you...he just needs a few hundred bucks wired to him so he can process the dough.  Perhaps you've gotten a realistic looking check mailed to you with a letter from some company saying it's a down payment for a big sweepstakes you've won and they just need a few grand sent Western Union to get you the rest of the million bucks they owe you.  Scam artists from Africa have been using these ploys for years to trick us out of our money.           

The latest scam involves puppies that are trapped with missionaries in Africa.  I expose it in my latest Hall of Shame story and have some fun messing with the scam artists.

The African scam letters are funny but they work.  This is your chance to post the letters you've received so we can all see them, have a laugh and warn others.  Post them here with your comments! 

For once, a sentence that punishes the bad guy!  Yes, punishment...that's what I think some of these Hall of Shame guys need.  Not another chance to make good...not a tough probation...a good old jail sentence for a good old crook.

Many times, I've interviewed sad, hurt, financially strapped victims of scam artists.  Often, after I expose the bad guy's deeds in my Hall of Shame, they get arrested and convicted.  More often than not, I'm pretty disgusted with the light sentences they get.  Hey, I'm all for rehabilitation for someone who deserves it, but a lot of these people don't.

I'm happy to say, the Suit Doctor, a traveling salesman who schemed local business people out of their cash with the promise of great deals has been dished out a bit of tough justice.

Judge Colleen O'brien sentenced him to 11 months in the pokey for getting arrested for swindling people in Ohio while on probation here.  This guy wasn't even allowed to leave the state of Michigan, much less get busted in the Buckeye State!

My thanks to the judge and Oakland County prosecutor for a job well done.

See you next year, Suit Doctor!

As I watched the sad search for Kelsey Smith on the news today, it brought back sad memories of a story I covered 15 years ago as a news reporter in Bakersfield, California. 

Beautiful, 18-year old Kelsey was abducted from a Target store parking lot last Saturday night.  Someone took her in her own vehicle which was found a few miles away and a body was found later in a wooded park. 

Beautiful, 18-year old Diana Contreras story is almost the same. 

One day, a man with the saddest face I'd ever seen walked into the newsroom at KGET television where I worked.  He had a handmade poster in his hand with a picture of his daughter Diana and the word "Missing" above it.  He told us she'd gone to the local mall the evening  before and hadn't come home.  I covered the search for the girl that day. 

Just like in the Overland Park story, grainy video of the parking lot revealed someone blitzing the victim and pushing her into her car which then drove out of the Mall's parking lot.  Diana's car was found a few miles away the next day in a fast food parking lot., but Diana was no where to be found. 

After days of searching, we heard over the police scanner a possible body being found in a deserted area several miles away.  One of our cameramen was near the area and was first on the scene.  I was in a newsvan miles away headed there when our photographer arrived.  Back in those days, our communication was done over walkie-talkie type radios and all of us could hear the talk between the news desk and the photographers.

Our assignment editor asked if our photographer who'd arrived on the scene could see the body.  He said he could.  The next question was "Is it Diana?"  There was a long pause and I can still hear the photographer's sad reply over the radio.  "Yes.  Yes, it's her."

Diana's killer was captured days later after using her credit card on a cross country joyride.  He was just a kid himself, maybe 20 years old.

I had many more meetings with Mr. Contreras, the man who'd come into the newroom that day fearing the worst.  I met him at his daughter's funeral and her trial and after her killer was sentenced to death row.

He never lost the sadness in his face.

 

Last summer, I introduced you to "Timothy Alexander", an interior decorator who took thousands of dollars from his clients and promised to decorate their homes.  He never finished the jobs and left his customers with bare walls and wallets.  It turns out, "Timothy Alexander" was really a convicted felon named Timothy Steensma.  I caught him pitching a job on an undercover camera, confronted him and put him in the Hall of Shame.

One of the victims from my story filed a police report and recently Timothy plead no contest to another felony...larceny by conversion.   However, Timothy didn't get sent to jail, he was put on probation and ordered to pay the victim back the 11-thousand dollars he took from her.  If he pays her back, he won't have to go to jail.  If he doesn't pay her back, he will have to serve six months behind bars.

Is this a good sentence?  The prosecutor told me it is because it will make the victim whole by getting her the money back.  However, is it really a punishment to simply have the convicted repay the money he took? 

What is your opinion? 

 

We've all been there.  You take your car into a shop for an oil change.  You watch as the mechanic starts poking around your car and soon hear the inevitable..."Uh oh!  Got a problem here!" 

Now, you're at his mercy as he explains to you that your 'discombobulator' is worn out and your 'whatzit' is shot.  Your routine oil change is now going to cost you big bucks.  You pay up and drive off several hundred dollars broker but with the peace of mind that having a new 'discombobulator' under the hood brings.  That is, until you start wondering if you really needed the work. 

Monday night on Fox 2 News at ten, I'll show you a shop that charges great rates on brakes...and they'll put them on your car whether you need them or not!  Do you need a brake job...or is this just a con job?  My special Hall of Shame investigation just might put the brakes on some of these shifty shops.

How about you?  Got an opinion on shifty car repair shops?

 

“You’re not going to believe this!”
Those words can only mean one thing…it’s Sweeps! What is sweeps? To you watching the tube it means fresh new episodes of your favorite network shows and “You’re not going to believe this!” news stories designed to keep you from switching the channel after American Idol, Grey’s Anatomy or Lost. February sweeps just ended. I can’t believe some of the “You’re not going to believe this” stories I watched on Detroit television during the last 28 days!
I was told that I wouldn’t believe what was kind of icky germs were dwelling on the sweaty exercise equipment at local gyms. I was told there were all kinds of bacteria and strepto-whatevers on the dumbbells. But the “You’re not going to believe this” was saved for those big Pilates balls that people sit their grimy, perspiring butts on. What was discovered on those balls? FECAL MATTER! Now don’t get me wrong, this is gross but to be honest, I can believe it. In fact, it doesn’t really surprise me. I mean, it’s a big rubber ball that you roll your rear all over while working up a tremendous sweat. Yeah, I can believe that it gets fecal matter on it. That’s why you shower after a good workout. Now, if there was fecal matter on the drinking fountain that, in my opinion, would be worthy of a “You’re not going to believe this!”
Another big sweeps “You’re not going to believe this” moment was for Dick Purtan’s big secret. They teased us. We tuned in. We found out Dick is worried about his charity continuing to be successful. Is that a secret? I kinda think that’s just human nature. I know I worry about continuing to do well in things that are important in my life. We all do, don’t we? C’mon! Gimme a secret! Strom Thurmond had a secret! Mike Cox had a secret! O.J.’s got a secret!

And then there are those “You’re not going to believe this” stories with the sexy titles. I watched one called “Confessions of a compulsive shopper.” Being a married man, I am somewhat familiar with this disease, if you catch my drift. Now, I thought the concept was interesting, but the compulsive shoppers didn’t seem all that mind-blowing. I mean, they had the shoppers lighted in silhouette to disguise them so they must’ve been embarrassed about something. I’m not sure what. The one lady had an addiction to shopping at thrift stores for the best bargains! If you’re going to confess to something give me a closet full of Saks Fifth Avenue dresses that have never been worn, give me a thousand dollar Jimmy Choo purse and 20 pairs of shoes you had to buy to match the thing! I want compulsion, baby!

Now don’t get me wrong, I may have been guilty of a few “You’re not going to believe this” stories in my time (maybe even more than a few) but let’s get real. If you’re going to promote something “You won’t believe” shouldn’t it be at least a little bit unbelievable?

What stories do you feel didn’t live up to the hype?