Don Christy, owner of PAI on Hilton Head, expected to plead guilty

A well-known property manager will likely plead guilty to fraud Tuesday — more than a year after he was accused of stealing more than $3 million from communities and property owners on Hilton Head Island.

Don Christy, owner of the now-shuttered Property Administrators Inc., is scheduled to go before federal District Judge David C. Norton in Charleston at 9:30 a.m. Tuesday for a plea hearing on five counts of wire fraud. His attorney, Mike Macloskie of Beaufort, said Christy has not definitively told him what he plans to do but that he “would not be surprised” if his client admitted to some wrongdoing.

“That’s consistent with his history of cooperating with this investigation,” said Macloskie, who declined to comment further.

Christy’s business closed its doors in February 2015 without notice, locking 21 property owners’ associations and regimes on Hilton Head out of their financial records. Federal investigators quickly determined that money was missing from some of the bank accounts the company managed.

The news was especially jarring to regimes that had been under Christy’s management since the early 1970s, the height of the mid-island development boom. He also served as chairman of the Hilton Head Island-Bluffton Chamber of Commerce board in 1974 and grew his business well beyond the south end of the island, into Bluffton and Georgia, before closing shop last year.

Macloskie said Thursday he doesn’t think Christy is working these days.

“His business is lost,” the attorney said.

Christy is still living in Beaufort County, according to Macloskie, but his home in Palmetto Dunes Oceanfront Resort is listed in the county’s June foreclosure sale. He owes more than $800,000 on the home, according to court records.

Christy’s accountant, Lisa Arnold, faces the same federal charges, as well as one count of misprision with a felony for allegedly covering up fraud, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said in November.

Though no plea hearing has been scheduled, Arnold’s attorney, Rose Mary Parham of Florence, said she hopes negotiations with the attorney’s office will conclude in the next three to four months.

“We’re still trying to work out a result everyone can live with,” Parham said.

The maximum penalty that Christy and Arnold could receive is 20 years imprisonment.

In November, federal agents charged Christy and Arnold, alleging they fraudulently obtained more than $3 million from clients between 2007 and 2014.

Several regimes have also filed lawsuits against Christy’s company.

One lawsuit included about a dozen regimes but was dismissed in November.

Three individual suits filed in October 2015 are still pending. Combined, Spindle Lane, Inverness Village and Barrington One allege they lost about $1.1 million, according to the three suits.

Another $1.2 million is believed to be missing from Centre Court villas, St. Andrews Commons and Inverness Village condominium communities in Palmetto Dunes, according to leaders of those regimes.

Several property owners’ associations declined to comment on the upcoming plea hearing and their financial situations this week. Most former clients have said they filed claims with insurance agencies and found new property managers, including IMC Resort Services on Hilton Head and Atlantic States Management in Bluffton.

Property Administrators closure: Where's the money?

 

March 28, 2015 The unexpected closure of a longtime property management company has thrown nearly two dozen Hilton Head Island regimes into confusion. Here's a deeper look at this industry on the island, and some warnings signs associations should know. | READ

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This story was originally published May 27, 2016 at 6:00 AM with the headline "Don Christy, owner of PAI on Hilton Head, expected to plead guilty."