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Current Restaurant Owner Speaks Out About Two Georges' Arrests
Posted: Feb 21, 2013 5:59 PM by Rachel Cole - rcole@kristv.com
Updated: Feb 21, 2013 6:44 PM
CORPUS CHRISTI -- U.S. Marshals arrested the former owners of the Two Georges' Seafood Restaurant, Michelle Chapman and Jim Ovecka, on theft charges yesterday in Tucson, Arizona. They're still being held in the Pima County Detention Center awaiting extradition back to Corpus Christi.
Police say Chapman and Ovecka skipped town back in September of 2011. Investigators say they defrauded customers out of tens of thousands of dollars. Authorities finally caught up with them yesterday at a trailer home park in Tucson. They're each being held on a $200,000 bond.
Their restaurant has since re-opened under new management, George Edwards, who is the original owner. He came back to pick up the pieces and says he is surprised at the previous owner's actions.
"They seemed fantastic, I would have never ever expected this from these people," Edwards said.
The restaurant is now called George's Seafood Company, Edwards says he can't believe Chapman and Ovecka are accused of defrauding more than 31 one of their customers.
"They did hurt this business and it's made it very very hard for me to make a quick come back," Edwards said.
Police reports say it was the banquet room which had to be held with a credit card, that ended up costing customers thousands of dollars when the price was manipulated.
"They got to hold the room and you're looking at an $800 turning into an $8,000 credit card mistake or something like that," Edwards said.
Edwards says the restaurant was his baby for 20 years when it first opened and that the $180,000 in credit card fraud has affected his business.
"I've had some people say that they were affected ok, and but yet they slowly heard about me opening back up again and they came back to see that it was original George," Edwards said.
Although the restaurant has re-opened, Edwards says he still has concerns.
"People think I'm still the same person and hopefully they understand now that I am not those people," he added.
There's no word yet on when the two suspects will be transported back to Nueces County.
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