CAPTURED: Karl and Helen Rehberg

[unsolvedmysteriesfan]

WANTED
KARL REHBERG
As seen on September 7, 2001 on Unsolved Mysteries

VITAL STATISTICS
AGE: 58 ( captured seven years later : 65 yrs old)
HEIGHT: 6'
WEIGHT: 225
http://www.unsolved.com/0142-Rehberg.html

Ex-Lakeland Couple Pleads Guilty to $21 Million Scam
By Jeremy Maready
Published: Wednesday, February 6, 2008
TAMPA | Bringing to a close one of the largest fraud schemes in Polk County history, Karl and Helen Rehberg, formerly of Lakeland, pleaded guilty Tuesday to charges stemming from a scam that bilked investors of nearly $21 million.

Karl Rehberg, 65, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit mail fraud and faces up to five years in federal prison, a $250,000 fine and three years of supervised release.

His wife, Helen, 66, faces up to 10 years in prison, a fine of $250,000 and three years' supervised release for obstructing justice in connection to the scheme.

Between 1992 and 1997, the Rehbergs sold about $20.6 million in unregistered NOPEC stock to more than 2,500 investors in several states, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

NOPEC was Rehberg's company that produced biodeisel fuel from used restaurant cooking grease.

Karl Rehberg was charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud because it carries a higher penalty than the selling of unregistered stocks, said Steve Cole, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office.

"The selling of unregistered securities is a much lesser penalty," he said. "He was charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud, which carries a penalty of five years. We felt that was the appropriate charge."

In late 1998, the Rehbergs fled the Tampa Bay area after learning they were the targets of a grand jury investigation into allegations of fraud involving NOPEC and after Karl Rehberg had begun plea negotiations with the U.S Attorney's Office.

The couple established several false identities and eventually settled in Mesa, Ariz., where they were arrested Aug. 22.

After the Rehbergs left town, they were seen in Michigan. And in 1999, the FBI said Rehberg was in New Mexico dressed in drag and using the name Peggy Helms.

In a previous interview, an apartment manager in Albuquerque described Peggy Helms as either a big nasty-looking woman or "a linebacker with laryngitis."

But a break in the case came last year, when Sgt. Ryan Russell of the Mesa Police Department began investigating the couple, who were using an alias.

An Internet search of some of Helen Rehberg's online accounts provided a link to the "Unsolved Mysteries" Web site and eventually led to their arrest.

Brock Self, a retired FBI agent, worked the case against Rehberg that led to the criminal charges against him.

Self said even after he retired in 1999, after the Rehbergs disappeared, he often fiddled on the Internet looking for him.

"It makes me feel really good because that was really the only case I had out there without closure," he said of Tuesday's plea. "It's been a long time since he left. But the case never died."

Self now works as a private investigator in Lakeland.

To his knowledge, he said, none of the 2,500 investors ever received their money back and probably never will.

After the Rehbergs' arrests, Self called Russell to thank him for pursuing the case and bringing it to an end.

"I wouldn't have wanted (Rehberg) to skate on that because the case was getting old," Self said. "Thankfully, it kept going. I knew he was out there."

The Rehbergs join Stephen Smith as operators of some of Polk's largest fraud schemes.

Smith was convicted of bilking 712 SH Oil investors, some considered the politically powerful and business elite of Winter Haven, out of $20 million. The decade-long pyramid scheme crashed in 1987.

Alice Faye Redd was convicted of stealing $3.6 million from investors in 1996. The people thought they were investing in Watson Clinic in Lakeland, where Redd's husband was a physician.

In 1995, Daniel Strader, son of a prominent Lakeland pastor, and Gary Pernice, a Georgia lawyer, got mostly Polk County residents to invest $3 million in a pyramid scheme.

[crystaldawn]

Wow, I must be slipping. I don't remember this segment either. Thanks for the update.

[pardilia]

Originally Posted by crystaldawn

Wow, I must be slipping. I don't remember this segment either. Thanks for the update.

The only thing that sparked my memory was the whole NOPEC bit. The segment was rather wordy and technical...very much like a news segment vs. the dramatic spin Unsolved Mysteries generally put on things.