New Jersey Contractor Allegedly Leaves Family High And Dry
ORADELL, N.J. (CBSNewYork) -- Some Bergen County homeowners are regretting their renovation plans after they say their contractor scammed them out of thousands of dollars and never did the work.
And that's not all.
A heap of demolition debris has been sitting in David Dankin's backyard for six months after a contractor left him high and dry.
"They get money up front, they start doing demolition, then you never hear from him," Dankin tells CBS2's Meg Baker.
The Dankins and two other Oradell families have filed criminal complaints and plan to sue Nick and Rose Sirico of Wood Art Design, formerly with a store front in Tenafly.
The families realized they weren't alone when they met the others in court.
Nick Sirico told the families he was a licensed cabinet broker and had a special promotion going on. The only problem was that the cabinets were never even ordered.
"We finally called the cabinet company directly and they said they never heard of him," Dankin said. "He never placed the order."
Sirico took deposits of more than $25,000 from each family for the cabinets. They paid for other work separately, but then suddenly workers told them they had to stop -- they had not been paid in months.
Dankin last spoke to Rose Sirico.
"She said 'unfortunately we don't have the money, you don't understand how this business works'," Rose said. "I said, 'well then you stole from us'. She said, 'no, you don't understand how the contracting business works'."
Five complaints have been filed with the Better Business Bureau against the Sirico's company. CBS2 knocked on the couple's home in Oradell but no one answered. Dankin says he hopes to alert other families of the scam.
Meanwhile, their Tenafly storefront is gone and the Siricos keep changing the name of their company, CBS2 reports.