Buying a car can feel like a lottery, especially when someone is gaming the system. However, justice has come to Ohio for a dealer who is accused of rolling back odometers on several vehicles.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Ohio, Simon Nwaru owned S. Automotive Ltd in Whitehall. However, between November 2020 and May 2022, Nwaru “knowingly disconnected, reset, and altered the mileage of vehicles, changing it from a higher reading to a lower one before selling them to buyers.”
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The government pointed to the rollback of eight different vehicles, whose mileage was reduced by approximately 80,000 to 100,000 miles (128,748-160,934 km) each. Doing the math reveals a total rollback of 640,000 to 800,000 miles (1 to 1.29 million km).
Nwaru was recently indicted by a grand jury for his involvement in the scheme, and the government noted that odometer fraud is a federal crime punishable by up to three years in prison. The U.S. Attorney’s Office added that odometer fraud is estimated to cost consumers over $1 billion annually.
This is a very alarming statistic, and it appears this is not Nwaru’s first run-in with the law. Years ago, he and his dealership were warned for numerous shady practices.
Specifically, the Ohio Attorney General claimed that they submitted false data about the actual mileage in written odometer disclosures and failed to inform some buyers about odometer discrepancies. However, the real bombshell was—”the discrepancy was the result of … rolling back odometers before selling the cars to buyers.”
The government also highlighted other issues with titles, documents, and failing to properly disclose that they were selling rebuilt cars after accidents.