Pool builder stole $1.5M from customers — and bought Super Bowl tickets, Florida cops say
The owner of an outdoor pool construction company is accused of stealing $1.5 million from customers in six Florida counties, state law enforcement officials said.
On Aug. 15, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement announced 35 felony charges against James Staten, the owner of Olympus Pools in Tampa, in a news conference posted to its Facebook page.
Staten is charged with one count of aggravated white collar crime, one count of organized scheme to defraud, 20 counts of grand theft, eight counts of misapplication of construction funds and five counts of contractor fraud, special agent Mark Brutnell said in the conference.
McClatchy News reached out to Richard Escobar, Staten’s attorney, for a comment and did not receive an immediate response.
Brutnell said multiple law enforcement agencies were contacted in 2021 by residents in Hillsborough, Pasco, Sarasota, Polk, Manatee and Pinellas counties saying they had paid for pool constructions that were never completed.
Through the complaints, agents identified 140 customers who Brutnell said were victims of Staten.
Of those, 31 customers shared a standard pattern from Olympus Pools, and their cases were used to file charges, according to Brutnell.
Brutnell said that over the course of about 18 months, Staten and the company defrauded those customers out of $1.5 million that was then used for personal expenses.
“Olympus Pools was in serious financial trouble in 2020,” Brutnell said in the news conference. “Staten knew that, but he continued to perpetrate his fraud.”
Pools never completed
Brutnell said the homeowners would meet with a sales representative from Olympus Pools, which typically required a 10% down payment to start the project.
“If the unsuspecting customer was willing to pay in full, they would get a discount rate and were assured of a much quicker timeline of completion,” Brutnell said.
The customers were promised an average completion time of about six months, officials said. Brutnell said many of the pools were never completed.
After months of no communication from Olympus Pools, the company would reach out to the customer and ask for more money for different aspects of the construction project, Brutnell said.
“For instance, ‘We need $10,000 to start excavation,’” Brutnell said.
After the company had received the money, workers said they were hiring subcontractors to finish up the work, but those workers never came, according to Brutnell.
The customers repeatedly reached out to Staten, and some hired attorneys, but Brutnell said Staten remained silent, and the projects sat idle.
Lavish lifestyle
Brutnell said an investigation into Staten’s finances showed he moved money out of the company’s business accounts into his personal account to “live a very lavish lifestyle.”
“This lifestyle included vacations, jewelry, vehicles, home improvements, expensive dinners and high end designer purchases,” Brutnell said.
The spending sometimes totaled $50,000 to $70,000 in a single month, he said in the news conference.
Staten took his employees and their family members on all-expenses-paid trips to Key West, Jamaica, New Orleans and Las Vegas, Brutnell said.
He also spent $53,000 on Super Bowl tickets when the event was hosted in Tampa in 2021, Brutnell said.
Some customers reached out to Shannon Behnken, an investigative reporter with WFLA, in 2021.
Behnken found the company had received a $264,800 Paycheck Protection Program loan in April 2020 and was reporting high sales despite customers across the greater Tampa area dealing with giant holes in their backyards, WFLA reported.
Dozens of homeowners told the outlet about their similar experiences, but their construction projects were never finished, according to WFLA.
Never operate in Florida again
Questions remained for years, and then on July 6, Attorney General Ashley Moody announced Olympus Pools was being shut down through the Consumer Protection Division, according to a news release.
“We are in the thick of summer when many Floridians want to enjoy their pools with friends and family, including many Florida consumers who fell victim to this owner’s greed and were left with holes in their backyard,” Moody said in the release.
Staten was ordered to pay restitution to the customers, but he was unable to come up with the money and filed for personal bankruptcy, according to the release.
“My Consumer Protection Division shut down this company and secured a lifetime ban for this owner to ensure he will not operate any pool business in Florida, ever again,” Moody said.
Staten’s attorney told WFLA he believes Staten did not intentionally steal money from customers.
“We just got on this case last week and there is a lot of work to do,” Escobar told the outlet. “But what the public needs to understand is that sometimes, businesses go belly up and just because a business goes bankrupt and people lose money, that does not make it a crime.”
Staten turned himself in to the Pasco County Jail on Aug. 14, according to the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office.
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