The owner of a Mahanoy City, Pennsylvania-area dealership has been charged after investigators discovered he’d tampered with the odometer of a used Silverado.
George Mammarella, age 58 and the owner of Village Auto Sales sold a used Silverado to a man named George Snyder on May 12, 2018. The buyer told police in the investigation that the used 2001 Silverado showed 61,000 miles on the odometer. Village Auto Sales marketed the truck for $12,500. According to the Lebanon Daily News, Snyder asked Mammarella about the mileage, which would raise all sorts of red flags in our collective used-car shopping book.
Not only does the mileage seem artificially low to begin with, but a 17-year-old truck like the Silverado in question should also show somewhere in the ballpark of 204,000 miles. The number comes from an average number of 12,000 miles driven annually.
Mammarella said the mileage shown was the true figure and the truck was a one-owner vehicle from Virginia. The buyer and seller agreed on a $10,000 sale price and the deal was complete.
However, the state police investigation turned up plenty of falsehoods. The dealership owner actually purchased the used Silverado with—wait for it—344,174 miles on the digital odometer. Then somehow, the vehicle was sold with 63,269 miles at the time of sale. A quick scan of used 2001 Silverados for sale show prices ranging from $3,000 to $7,000 with around 200,000 miles on the odometer. With over 300,000 miles on the odometer, this truck was certainly nowhere near worth its sale price.
The dealer owner was charged with theft by deception, deceptive business practices, tampering with records, engaging in unprofessional conduct and substantial misrepresentation of material fact. It’s unclear if the buyer received his $10,000 back, but perhaps the entire story is a lesson in ensuring a seller is trustworthy and credible before pulling the trigger on a used vehicle.
Comments
My 2001 suburban just hit 67k last week. I guess I’ll be going to jail too for having an old truck with low miles.
You would only go to jail if you rolled back the odometer and tried to sell it to someone based on the false mileage. I understand your point that it’s very possible to have low miles on a truck that old, but the buyer’s suspicions turned out to be correct.
You won’t go to jail for that but if writing ignorant comments on this blog were a crime you would spend the rest of your life in jail.
I got a 1976 Silverado with 68000,I’ll be in the next cell…..
Can’t roll them back. He probably just swapped in a cluster with lower miles and tried to run with it. Private party sale i could see this happenening often but from a dealer…thats just sad.
You don’t have to change a cluster, any miles can be written with professional equipment.
It’s interesting how the buyer didn’t get suspicious at the time of purchase and look carefully to things like seat wear, pedals, floor wear (carpet), shifter, radio knobs, door handles etc.
These things can be noticeable with 50k difference , but are obvious with almost 300k difference. Unless the seller completely swapped the interior.
What did Car-Fax say?
I got a 2001 2500hd with a little over 69,000 about six months ago but it had all the oil change receipts that showed the mileage was right.