Supplier Claims Bluff City Mayor Owes Money

BLUFF CITY, Tenn. – A Maryland communications equipment supplier claims Bluff City Mayor Todd Malone owes him more than $10,000 and said Thursday he will file suit to collect the debt.

“We’re a small business,” said Andy Lisle, owner of ACL Distributors in Marriottsville, Md. “Ten thousand dollars is a lot of money for us. All we want is the money returned to us.”

Lisle said Malone, who owns Racescan Technologies in Bluff City, owes him for five equipment shipments sent to Malone’s business from July 17 to Oct. 1. The shipments are worth $10,810, according to invoices Lisle faxed to the Herald Courier on Thursday.

Malone admitted Thursday that he owed Lisle the money. But six weeks ago, he closed down Racescan Communications and said he is now working with lawyers to satisfy his debts, even if it means filing for bankruptcy.

“What I’ve done I had to do to protect myself and my business,” said Malone, who has owned the business for the past six years. “I have tried to have a peaceful
closure of my business and so far it hasn’t been [what I wanted.]”

Malone declined to discuss specific details about his business with Lisle. He also said he has a large inventory from his store safely in storage and is working to collect debts owed to him by some of his customers.

“I don’t know what the outcome will be,” Malone said. He added he “would let his attorney, with the help of the good Lord, work it all out.”

Malone started working at Racescan in 1995 and took over the operation July 1, 2003. The business is perhaps best known for selling radios that monitor NASCAR driver frequencies to race fans at the speedway.

Malone was elected to the city’s Board of Mayor and Aldermen in May 2007, and he took over the mayor’s job after the city’s two previous mayors, Bob Thomas and Tom Anderson, quit before finishing their terms.

Lisle said he has supplied Racescan with headsets, portable scanners and batteries for several years. But in July, Lisle said, Malone failed to pay him for $2,047 worth of equipment.

Lisle continued to send Racescan equipment until Oct. 1, including a $6,659 shipment Aug. 11, one week before the Sharpie 500.

Invoices for each of these shipments claim that any amount “more than 30 days past due is subject to a monthly finance charge” and the customer must also pay one-fourth the fees of any attorney hired to collect the debt.

Lisle said he hasn’t been able to reach Malone since the last shipment. Phone calls and letters to Malone’s home have not been returned, he said, and Racescan’s listed telephone numbers are either disconnected or ring indefinitely.

“They won’t take any calls because now they’re hiding from people,” said Lisle, who has talked with other vendors who did business with Malone.

Lisle said he did not know Malone was the mayor of Bluff City until Thursday, after he contacted the Bluff City Police Department, the Sullivan County Sheriff’s Office and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation to see if there were any criminal charges he could file against Malone.

All three agencies told Lisle there is nothing they could do because Malone had not violated any laws. They claimed it was a civil matter and that they were not going to get involved, Lisle said.

On Thursday, Sullivan County District Attorney General Greeley Wells declined to comment specifically about Malone’s situation, but he said generally a failed business deal is against the law only if there is fraud involved.

“Simply because you made a bad deal does not make it a crime. There has to be some sort of intent to not pay the bill at the time of purchase,” Wells said. “[What happened] seems like a straight-forward business deal where the supplier sent the merchandise to the retailer on credit.”

Wells said Lisle’s only legal recourse would be to file a civil lawsuit against Malone. Lisle said he intends to do just that.

Malone received his last shipment from Lisle on Oct. 3. Three weeks later, on Oct. 22, he closed Racescan down.

“The business struggled with the economy and I struggled with it,” Malone said Thursday. “There’s a time that comes when you just can’t do no more.”

Due to high gas prices, Malone said, many NASCAR fans clamped down on their spending during race week and could no longer afford to buy his scanners. But it was when local governments started feeling the pinch, Malone said, that things really started to go sour for his business.

Perhaps the biggest part of Racescan’s business, he said, comes from installing radio equipment, video cameras and sirens on new police cars and ambulances. Many of his clients stopped buying when they tightened their budgets to make up for projected losses in tax revenue.

“Everybody’s cutting money and it affected us with our business,” Malone said. “It got to the point where we couldn’t afford to keep our doors open.”

gmclean@bristolnews.com | (276) 645-2518