Denton Record-Chronicle (Denton, Tex.), Vol. 111, No. 190, Ed. 1 Sunday, February 8, 2015 Page: 3 of 38
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STATE
3A
Denton Record-Chronicle
Sunday, February 8, 2015
Midas shop owner
learns hard lesson
»
,v
VOTE
FOR VS
AGAIN!!!
ike Pace is insistent,
almost demanding,
that I must come see
him. He wants to tell his side of
the story about his Midas car
repair shop in turmoil.
Quite a change of heart.
Last month, when two of his
former employees accused him
of unethical behavior, he wasn’t
answering questions.
I couldn’t get his side. This
makes The Watchdog uncom-
fortable. I had a customer who
was told by a former employee
of Pace’s that if she paid cash
for a repair, she could get it
done for half price, but she
wouldn’t get a receipt. She took
the deal.
When the repair didn’t
work, she returned to the shop
but was told that she was a vic-
tim of the now-gone manager
who ran a scheme.
If she didn’t like Pace’s offer
for restitution, he told her, she
could chase after the manager
herself.
My colleague Marina Tra-
han Martinez tracked down
that manager and former me-
chanic.
Former manager Jason
Gracom said he had been tak-
ing orders from Pace, who, he
claimed, had organized the
cash scheme.
Mechanic Rick Solis said
cheating customers wasn’t un-
usual for where they worked —
the Midas shop on Midway
Road in Carrollton.
Pace wasn’t talking. But
now that’s changed. Now he is
leading Marina and me up a
flight of darkened steel stairs,
smooth from years of oil and
fluids buildup, to an office loft
atop his Midas shop in Plano.
Marina is careful in her high
heels. Behind us is Pace’s fa-
ther, Buddy, who started the
family business almost 40
years ago.
The air is smoky. We don’t
%
\
ABOUT THIS COLUMN
The Watchdog Desk works for you to shine light on questionable practices
in business and government. We welcome your story ideas and tips.
Contact The Watchdog
Email: watchdog@dallasnews.com
Call: 214-977-2952
Write: Dave Lieber, P.0. Box 655237, Dallas, TX 75265
1
is lying about him to protect
himself.
Gracom, in response, stands
by his story: “We already talked
about this,” he writes Marina.
“Of course he wouldn’t admit
to cutting corners on the busi-
ness side.”
Up in his office, Pace shows
us a stack of invoices from car
parts stores. Gracom was buy-
ing thousands of dollars in
parts and charging them to the
store’s account, Pace says.
Those parts were used in the
scheme.
Pace didn’t see the parts bill
until the end of the month. By
then, he had already fired Gra-
com, which he did when he re-
turned from Vegas.
The owner says he doesn’t
know how many customers
were involved in the special
deal because those records
don’t exist. Based on walk-in
complaints, he has a dozen sol-
id cases of customers who took
Gracom’s cash offer, he says.
Father and son estimate
they lost up to $20,000 in la-
bor and parts for jobs not en-
tered into the system and ac-
companying parts they had to
pay for.
Pace picks little holes
through his former manager’s
shows us what he says are Gra-
com’s tools, which he’s holding
for “collateral.”
Pace says he recently got a
call for a job reference for Gra-
com, who claimed he worked
for Pace for years. It was only a
few months.
Pace wants Carrollton po-
lice to investigate. Police origi-
nally told Pace this was a civil
dispute. Police aren’t com-
menting.
Pace started his career as a
5-year-old boy hanging out at
his father’s first Midas shop.
Now, 35 years later, he sits at a
desk with these words on the
wall behind him: “Living Lega-
Dave Lieber
he inest estern Wear
or rork Or Play!
Since 1957
THE WATCHDOG
know what father and son are
going to say. Pace takes us into
his back office and begins his
story.
Corner of Bell & Hickory
Downtown Denton
It takes only minutes before
we realize that Pace is probably
not guilty of theft or tax fraud
or anything else the pair said
about him. Pace is guilty of
something else, something
more common in the modern
940.382.1921
www.weldonswestern.com
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Va
workplace.
He’s guilty of not keeping a
close eye on his business, his
employees and all the paper-
work that goes with it.
The scheme he describes
went on for several months,
but it peaked in a two-week pe-
riod.
SADDLE SHOP, WESTERN WEAR
& TEXAS COWBOY IVHJSEUIVI
cy-
On the opposite wall, he
posts the monthly loan note he
pays his father for ownership.
When son tells me this, father
tears up.
Everybody stops for a mo-
NEW RESISTOL
STRAW HATS ARE IN!
So Pace is guilty, too, of leav-
ing town and not knowing
what was going on back home.
Weird thing. Pace left town
in the fall to go to Las Vegas to
attend a convention of Midas
dealers. The point? To get bet-
ter at what he does. Get the Mi-
das Touch.
What he didn’t know, he
says, is that back home at one of
his nine Midas shops, Gracom
was applying the Midas touch
in a different way.
Pace says his former man-
ager collected cash from doz-
ens of customers who took the
half-price, no-receipt offer.
Pace says it was unauthorized
and he had no idea this was
happening. He lost thousands
of dollars in business.
He says his former manager
ment.
Then son says he has
learned his lesson. He’s going
to pay closer attention.
“Make sure I pay attention
to the cameras,” the son says.
“Make sure I listen to the
phone calls.”
Add to that: When a former
employee accuses you of
wrongdoing — and you know
it’s not true — say so.
Staff writer Marina Trahan
Martinez contributed to this
report.
Follow Dave Lieber on Twit-
ter at @Dave Lieber.
Check out The Watchdog at
11:20 a.m. Mondays on NBC5
talking about matters impor-
tant to you.
,r
story.
I
Gracom told Marina he
VOTE NOW!!
could not steal and get away
with it because cameras are
placed above cash registers.
Pace says the cameras were
installed recently, after this
happened.
Gracom says Pace sold his
tools as an act of revenge. Pace
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After the cleanup, volunteers are invited to a Volunteer Party
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Parks, Scott K. Denton Record-Chronicle (Denton, Tex.), Vol. 111, No. 190, Ed. 1 Sunday, February 8, 2015, newspaper, February 8, 2015; Denton, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1124779/m1/3/?q=%22~1~1~1%22~1&rotate=0: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .