What Happened in Vegas...

Clients nationwide are entrusting private financial information to a Tempe anti-identity-theft firm that’s based on a bluff...

At 43, with an ex-wife and two kids, he told the government in his bankruptcy filing that he had $20 in his pocket and $15 in the bank. He was hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt.

Maynard, a Valley native and former Marine, had seen some success in the late 1990s as the founder of Internet America, an early Internet service provider. He had owned a nice home in Ahwatukee with expensive cars in the driveway. He had bragged he would retire at age 35. Those days were gone.

Still, Maynard was optimistic. He'd been through this before. He's the type who jumps back up after a fall — one of those edgy entrepreneurs who always seem to be on the verge of great success or great failure.

His first personal bankruptcy was in 1990, and he had filed again in 1994 for one of his failed companies.

But even as his finances sunk to new depths, his next big business venture was taking off. Drawing on his experience in credit repair and with the Internet, Maynard dreamed up a service that would protect people against the dreaded crime of identity theft.

Lifelock, as his new company would come to be called, began offering services to the public the same month in 2005 that Maynard filed still another bankruptcy.

LifeLock's primary service is nothing you can't do yourself. If you think someone has stolen your identity, you can call one of the three major credit bureaus, TransUnion, Experian or Equifax, and place an electronic red flag, called a fraud alert, on your account.

Maynard claimed he got the idea for LifeLock after spending a week in jail in 2003. The pair have told his story ever since as a frightening example of what can happen to victims of identity theft. The details vary slightly in articles and television news reports, but the story goes something like this:

A few years ago, Maynard answered a knock on his door in Phoenix one morning to find five deputies holding a warrant for his arrest. They accused him of failing to pay back a $16,000 casino loan to the Mirage in Las Vegas and, despite his protests, hauled him off to the Maricopa County Jail. Maynard had not even been in Vegas when the casino made its loan. One of the guys who stole Maynard's identity and the casino's money is now doing time for murder. Maynard was released after seven days, but he spent more than $20,000 and countless hours on the telephone trying to clear his name. While sitting in his jail cell, he came up with the plan for LifeLock so other people could avoid being victimized by identity thieves.

It's a story that stokes the public's worst fears of identity theft, a crime that induces a state of near-paranoia in many of us. Though not a crime of violence, victims are left feeling violated, even when financial losses are small. Nationwide, the problem is immense, costing at least $50 billion a year and forcing consumers, businesses, and governments to become more savvy in trying to prevent it.

Horror stories like Maynard's are staples in almost any discussion about identity theft. Clearly, such stories may influence people to take counter-measures — signing up with LifeLock, for instance. No wonder that Maynard and Davis, LifeLock's chief operating officer, seem to relish repeating how Maynard became a victim.

Maynard's life was soon looking up again — big time.

Today, he's one of the heads of a multimillion-dollar company based in Tempe that employs dozens of people. The company claims to have more than 150,000 customers, which is a lot of people paying $10 a month. Last month, a trio of investors, including the local Biltmore Ventures group, gave LifeLock an additional $6 million in seed funding. LifeLock advertises heavily on the Internet and radio; its ads can be heard on the Howard Stern, Paul Harvey and Rush Limbaugh shows.

Against a backdrop of unrelenting hype over identity theft, credulous news reporters gulped Maynard's story down like cold beer. But a simple Google search reveals Maynard's credibility in the business community was long ago shot.

His credit-repair company was shut down by authorities in the early 1990s for false advertising and deceptive practices. Forced closure means that a federal court order has banned Maynard from working in the credit-repair industry — forever.

That he continues to work in the industry, despite the court order, should surprise no one who knows his history. It also shouldn't surprise anybody that Maynard's story about how he became a victim is only partially true.

Maynard did, in fact, spend a week in jail in 2003 because of an unpaid $16,000 casino marker drawn from the Mirage.

It was Maynard's marker. The casino took a copy of his Arizona driver's license when he took out the loan.

There was no identity theft.

But an even more serious reflection on Maynard in his new role as Mr. Identity Theft can be found alongside the paper trail of lawsuits against him in Maricopa County Superior Court.

American Express sued Maynard's father in 2005 for $154,000 in unpaid bills. But Dr. Robert J. Maynard Sr., a prominent local eye doctor, denied he ordered the card.

Records show that someone with Maynard Sr.'s personal information ordered the card. But that someone didn't have the bills sent to Maynard Sr.'s home. Instead, the bills went to a company called Netshield, at a Phoenix address used by one of Maynard Jr.'s former firms.

Though Maynard Sr. says he never asked for the card, he settled with the company. Coincidentally, Maynard Jr. has $170,000 in debt to American Express listed on his 2005 bankruptcy paperwork — and his father is named as a co-debtor. {snip} Maynard's case was actually very simple, Zadrowski says.

A casino marker is the same thing as a personal check under Nevada law. It's a way gamblers avoid the risk of carrying around big wads of cash. A high-roller submits a form for the marker with his or her checking account number and obtains a stack of chips. The casino then has the right to deposit the marker at any time but usually waits a few months. That way, Zadrowski says, if the gambler's losses are high, the casino gives the gambler time to pay the money back. And everyone is happy.

If the check bounces, the casino makes a number of collection attempts, and if that doesn't work, the case is referred to authorities.

Records show that on January 15, 2003, Zadrowski's office contacted the Arizona Department of Public Safety and put a warrant out for Maynard's arrest. Six months later, on June 20, officers from DPS and Phoenix police went to a Phoenix apartment, picked Maynard up and took him to a Maricopa County Jail unit.

It was Maynard's second time behind bars. DPS records show he was stopped for speeding on Arizona Highway 68 near Bullhead City in 1991 and taken to jail in Mohave County because of an unpaid speeding ticket.

Faced with untold numbers of gamblers who fail to pay their markers, the Clark County D.A.'s office long ago created a diversion program that gives deadbeats a second chance to pay up rather than face criminal charges. Once Maynard finally coughed up the 16 grand, Nevada dropped its criminal case against him.

Because Las Vegas is one of the identity-theft capitals of the world — right up there with the Phoenix metro area — Clark County provides a "forgery packet" to anyone claiming to be a victim. A claim like Maynard's would have been investigated thoroughly, Zadrowski maintains.

"Not once did anybody ever suggest, in this particular case, that this was a case of stolen identity," he says.

Maynard never filed a police report for identity theft, or it would be part of the D.A.'s office file, Zadrowski says.

"The only call we received while he was in jail was from his girlfriend. She wanted to know how to get him out of jail," he says.

Zadrowski pulled the Arizona driver's license submitted to the casino by the person who took out the loan and e-mailed a copy to New Times.

Although the resolution quality is poor, the man in the picture looks like Maynard. Zadrowski says the man pictured is Maynard.

Maynard's girlfriend at the time, Valley resident Betsey Griffin, is listed on Maynard's 2005 bankruptcy report as being owed $10,000. Reached by phone, she says she had nothing to do with getting Maynard out of jail and did not pay the $16,000 for him.

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