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Search for title company's millions leads to employee

Much of $7.9-million looted from Gulf Coast Title remains missing.

By JEFF TESTERMAN, Times Staff Writer
Published October 11, 2007

ADVERTISEMENT [Hicks family] Cheryl Weylau greeted Marlin Hicks at a recent birthday party for Marlin. The two were classmates at Dunedin High School. Complete coverage Title business boomed, but the cash vanished Life was hard but lucrative at Gulf Coast, until the owners were charged with stealing millions. (9/23) Lavish life over, pair face prison Title business misspent millions, authorities say. (9/14)

CLEARWATER -- With last month's arrests of John and Cheryl Wehlau on charges of looting $7.9-million from the escrow accounts of their title company, investigators were left with a huge question.

Most of the stolen money is still missing, so what happened to it?

For the answer, they are focusing on an old Dunedin High School classmate of Cheryl Wehlau's, a car salesman named Marlin Hicks.

Trained as a photographer, Hicks spent a year at the Wehlaus' title company, returned to car sales and rejoined Gulf Coast Title as a title agent.

Fellow employees referred to Hicks, a favorite of Cheryl Wehlau's, as "untouchable." He sat in on top management meetings, was given a Cadillac Escalade and paid $78,517 a year. He enjoyed all-expense-paid Las Vegas trips, courtesy of the Wehlaus.

Now state investigators are looking into the Hicks/Wehlau relationship. A St. Petersburg Times review found a web of connections, including:

• The day after Gulf Coast was shut down and auditors began tracing millions missing from title escrow accounts, the Wehlaus recorded a deed transferring their home in Palm Harbor to Marlin Hicks for $125,000. Hicks obtained mortgages on the property totaling $285,000 and, according to the lawyer representing Hicks' wife in a divorce, transferred funds back to the Wehlaus. The value of the property Hicks got from the Wehlaus for $125,000? In court records, Hicks says it's worth $400,000.
• As the title company went out of business and the Wehlaus lost their home, the family moved into a new place in Pasco County. Records show their daughter paid $280,000 for it, with $100 down and mortgages totaling $279,900. But prosecutors say the 21-year-old daughter is autistic, incapable of entering a real estate contract or earning the income to support the mortgages. The lender was Universal American Mortgage, where Hicks worked as a loan officer.

Now back working as a car salesman, Hicks would not discuss specifics of his involvement with the Wehlaus. He said he knew nothing about the state investigation into his dealings with them.

"I'm glad these things are coming up," said Hicks, 42. "When they do, I'll address them."

The divorce attorney for Hicks' wife, Zafu, recently told a family law judge that she may cooperate with the statewide prosecutor investigating the Wehlaus and her husband.

"If it comes to your attention that certain assets are suspect, I have to do what I can to shelter my client and her children," attorney Charles Monty said after the hearing.

"It's a huge concern when you get a call and someone says they're looking for $7.9-million."

* * *

The Wehlaus, both 42, were charged last month with 25 felony counts apiece: theft from an escrow account, grand theft and money laundering.

Investigators say the Wehlaus used the escrow account in their trust at Gulf Coast Title Closings and Escrow Services like an ATM, withdrawing cash, laundering it through commercial and personal bank accounts, then using it to finance a lavish lifestyle.

Commonwealth Land Title Insurance Co., the underwriter that wrote title polices for Gulf Coast, discovered the huge deficit in the escrow account after an insider's tip. Commonwealth says it is out $7.9-million after paying claims to home buyers, surveyors, appraisers and others whose checks bounced after Gulf Coast went out of business.

Investigators traced the Wehlaus' expenditure of $661,000 in escrow funds to the purchase of a $1.32-million Wentworth Country Club home in Tarpon Springs and a $300,000 Lansbrook Village condo in Palm Harbor.

But millions more remain unaccounted for.

Some may have been burnt up in Las Vegas, where Hicks accompanied the Wehlaus on two junkets. Zafu Hicks went the first time, Monty said, and saw the Wehlaus "spending money like water -- ten, twenty, thirty-thousand a day on gambling, clothing, jewelry."

Shocked at the splurge, Monty said, Zafu refused to join her husband on the second Vegas trip.

Marlin Hicks shrugged off the Vegas trips as just another business expense. "Well, I was employed by them," he said.

* * *

After the whistle-blower's tip, Gulf Coast was padlocked on Jan. 5, 2006. A day later, the Wehlaus recorded a deed transferring the Nature's Watch home at 1720 Arabian Lane to Hicks for a fraction of its value.

Records show the price was $125,000, and for cash, because no mortgage was recorded. A year later, Marlin Hicks said on a financial statement the 3,240-square-foot townhouse was worth $400,000.

A few weeks after buying it he took out a $185,000 mortgage, and eight months later, another mortgage for $100,000.

According to Monty, some $60,000 of the first loan's proceeds was channeled to the Wehlaus. About $75,000 from the second loan was used to buy a certificate of deposit, Marlin Hicks said in a deposition in his divorce case. Other cash from the loans may have been kept in a locked safe that only Marlin Hicks could open, according to divorce papers.

In August 2006, Marlin Hicks and the Wehlaus collaborated on another real estate deal, involving the purchase of a $280,000 Lennar Homes property at 12217 Southbridge Ter. in Hudson. To finance the purchase, two loans totaling $279,900 were signed for by Victoria Lynn Wehlau, the daughter who prosecutors say is autistic.

The two loans were from Universal American Mortgage, Lennar's lending company.

Hicks, who worked there when the loans were made, refused to discuss the mortgages on the Hudson home.

The notary attesting to Victoria Wehlau's signature on the loan papers said she was identified by a driver's license -- though there is no record of a Florida license issued to her.

The Wehlau family lived in the Hudson home for several months until payments were missed. The bank has filed for foreclosure.

* * *

After Zafu sued Marlin for divorce this year, the couple fought over ownership rights to Bee Haven Home, a Safety Harbor adult living facility for handicapped adults.

Marlin's mother, Beatrice Williams, had provided the property for the home. Marlin and Zafu Hicks owned it, with Zafu acting as administrator.

In a bitter battle for this Medicaid-reimbursed asset, two people made a surprise appearance at an attempted corporate takeover meeting in June: Cheryl and John Wehlau. Zafu Hicks called police, who recorded the Wehlaus' presence.

After the meeting, a stock certificate was prepared showing a change: Beatrice Williams was now a one-third owner of Bee Haven. A judge presiding over the Hicks divorce case questioned the certificate, saying it was created "under very suspicious circumstances."

In the Hicks-Wehlau connections, one man stands in the middle: attorney Bruce R. Young.

The Clearwater attorney represented Cheryl Wehlau in a 2005 divorce that was later dismissed.

He also represented her in the civil action that Commonwealth brought over funds misappropriated at Gulf Coast. Young advised Cheryl Wehlau not to answer questions in the civil case in order to preserve her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination in the criminal investigation. Young later withdrew from the Gulf Coast case.

Now, Young represents Marlin Hicks in his divorce case.

He also represented Williams in the Bee Haven Home controversy. Young was paid $14,000 from the business and advised the Wehlaus to attend the corporate takeover meeting, according to court records.

Young withdrew from representing Williams after Zafu complained that it was a conflict of interest for him to represent Marlin in the divorce and his mother in the Bee Haven case.

Young and Williams did not return calls seeking comment.

Bee Haven was not the only business connection between Hicks' mother and the Wehlaus. Williams is listed as the president and sole director of the Just Original Floral Design and Gifts shop in Lutz, which the Wehlaus ran after their title company was shut down last year.

The landlord, Tom Theilges, said the Wehlaus left three months' rent unpaid and the shop "trashed" when they were arrested. He said he had never heard of Beatrice Williams.

Times researcher John Martin contributed to this report. Jeff Testerman can be reached at testerman@sptimes.com or (813) 226-3422.

[Last modified October 10, 2007, 23:26:52]