My heart goes out to all of the families, of both customers and suppliers, affected by this. We had the absolute worst experience and tried to post everywhere we could think of. I believe the first signs of this was in the summer of 2010. We had even interviewed a recent customer before signing. They were supposed to finish in August They never ""officially"" signed off on our pool, we made it clear that they were not getting our last $2k when they still weren't complete in December and we received a notice from a subcontractor. We held the final payment over Butch's head until the subcontractor called and verified that he was paid. They never showed up again. While there are postings about his son John, we could see the relationship there. He was put in a very bad place and in over his head while his dad pulled the strings and was creating a financial nightmare. Towards the end John had to know something, however, and should have stood up. Late in the game, we had heard about Butch's gambling problems, and mentioned it to one of his workers when they came by; his reaction validated it for us. I'm glad there were criminal charges filed, as I do believe he stole the money and gambled it away. Our pool was about $40k. Even 18 pools paying only 1/2 down would have been $360k. Pool builders use your money to pay for the materials on the next pool, with that many pools in the ground, you don't go bankrupt, you steal the money. Good luck to everyone. We will help in any way we can.
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