Pair accused of scamming air charter firm: Jet Aviation at Teterboro Airport (KTEB), New Jersey

NEWARK — Dante Dixon may not be honest, but he does have style.

When he needed to get from New Jersey to Miami, the convicted scam artist didn’t bother with a commercial flight. He chartered a corporate jet. He also arranged a limo ride to the airport before anyone realized he had no money.

Then he did it again. And again.

But that’s only part of the Dante Dixon saga. There was also thousands of dollars more in executive gifts at Tiffany’s, all put on a fraudulent corporate account, and $25,466 in overnight stays at an exclusive South Beach boutique hotel.

Dixon, 45, of Miami, who was arrested at his mother’s house in Akron, Ohio, and Christopher Henderson, 32, also of Akron, were both taken into custody today by the FBI, charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman said the two men made at least four flights between May and June through Jet Aviation, a worldwide business aviation services company headquartered at Teterboro, by pretending to be high-level executives at an unnamed financial institution.

Dixon, jailed more than a decade ago in a complex credit card scheme using sham companies to mine personal information on potential victims through credit reporting agencies, was charged with racking up $164,911 in charter flights, and another $10,879 in limousine services over a two-month period.

According to a criminal complaint filed in federal court in Newark, the two arranged a line of credit after an individual using the name "Josh Stevens" called Jet Aviation’s offices in Chicago, Ill., and Van Nuys, Calif., to inquire about its private charter flight services. The individual allegedly identified himself as a senior vice president at a "well-known financial institution." The company was not identified in the complaint.

A Jet Aviation employee subsequently sent an e-mail to an address purported to be affiliated with the institution containing a draft Charter Services Agreement, which was signed by Stevens and returned to Jet Aviation on May 9. The agreement listed Stevens as a senior vice president, Dixon as a vice president, and Henderson as a vice president of international affairs.

Jet Aviation, based on the agreement, created an account and a $350,000 line of credit, which was later tapped to arrange for flights between California, Ohio, New Jersey and Miami.

The company today did not returns calls for comment.

It all unraveled in June after a Jet Aviation employee met Dixon and Henderson as they boarded a charter flight from Teterboro to Miami and contacted the company where they supposedly worked, only then learning that neither were employees.

Officials said Jet Aviation was never paid for the charter flights or limousine services.

Prosecutors said the two also used their fake corporate credentials at the Tiffany & Co. store in Bal Harbour, Fla., and The W South Beach Hotel in Miami, charging $19,991 in watches, sunglasses, sterling silver and leather business cardholders, and men’s cologne from Tiffany, and approximately $25,466 in overnight hotel stays at The W.

Court records — confirmed by federal prosecutors — show Dixon has a history of criminal fraud. He was charged in July 2000 in a scheme to obtain hundreds of unauthorized credit cards by submitting applications using the identities of real individuals, both living and deceased, through phony companies that were used as mail-drop addresses.

One of the companies was used to collect personal identification from real people, as well as obtain credit reports on unwitting victims, according to the court filings. Prosecutors said the scheme led to $1.4 million in losses to several financial institutions. Dixon was later sentenced to six years in prison.

Dixon and Henderson both made their initial court appearances before U.S. Magistrate Judge Kathleen Burke in Akron federal court today and were ordered held until they can be transported to New Jersey.

If convicted, the two face up to 20 years in prison, and a maximum fine of $250,000.

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Jet Aviation:  http://www.jetaviation.com