By Gerald Carroll
\nA number of Visalia furniture-store customers who say they never received their purchases are taking the former owner of Anna Marie’s Home Furnishings to court.<\/p>\n
Anna Shoemaker has failed to deliver furniture to at least eight people \u00e2\u20ac\u201d some for as long as 18 months \u00e2\u20ac\u201d the customers claim.
\nThe buyers combined paid at least $10,000 for the furniture, said Kathy Ezell of Visalia, who on Monday earned a $1,200 judgment against Shoemaker in Tulare County Small Claims Court.
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\n“I think we all just want our money back,” she said.<\/p>\n
Ezell said more aggrieved customers could surface.<\/p>\n
“We’re just now finding out how many of us have been affected,” she said. “A family was there in court with me to find out what they have to do. They told me they’ve lost $5,300 on a bedroom suite they saved for years to buy.”<\/p>\n
The Visalia Police Department has launched an investigation, Visalia Police Det. Brian Fomavia said Tuesday.<\/p>\n
He said he could offer no details.<\/p>\n
Shoemaker was not available for comment Tuesday.<\/p>\n
The business \u00e2\u20ac\u201d full name: Anna Marie’s Home Furnishings at Colonial Shopping Center \u00e2\u20ac\u201d operated in southwest Visalia for 10 years.<\/p>\n
It closed in July 2013 and Shoemaker announced plans to move to the Visalia Shopping Center on the northeast corner of Mooney Boulevard and Caldwell Avenue.<\/p>\n
The new store never opened.<\/p>\n
Last November, Visalia Shopping Center’s Dallas-based owners informed customers, on behalf of Shoemaker, that problems conforming with city of Visalia guidelines had delayed the opening of the new store.<\/p>\n
But on Tuesday, a business called Professor Toy began moving equipment and merchandise into the building.<\/p>\n
Another Anna Marie’s customer, Rich Davis, is scheduled to appear in small-claims court Oct. 1. He said he bought a table from Shoemaker’s store and liked it so much that in January 2013, he ordered $891.50 worth of additional items.<\/p>\n
“No furniture yet, and we paid full price,” Davis said. “We’ve been after her for quite some time.”<\/p>\n
At the time of the purchase Shoemaker had a “store full of furniture,” he said.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, Shoemaker’s trademark pink furniture-delivery truck was parked at her residence on Parkwood Street near El Diamante High School. A BMW convertible parked alongside it has drawn the attention of another customer, Susan Vossler of Visalia.<\/p>\n
“That’s a new BMW,” said Vossler, who said Shoemaker owes her $1,250. “How is it possible to buy a new BMW when she owes everyone all this money?”<\/p>\n
The sale of Shoemaker’s delivery truck would generate “at least $14,000 to $15,000 and help pay all of us off,” Davis said. Tulare County property records show that on Feb. 15 and June 26, tax liens were attached to property owned by Shoemaker. A notice of default was filed June 14, and an ownership change was recorded July 28 by Deutsche Bank National Trust Company.<\/p>\n
The reporter can be reached at gcarroll@visalia.gannett.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Gerald Carroll A number of Visalia furniture-store customers who say they never received their purchases are taking the former owner of Anna Marie’s Home Furnishings to court. Anna Shoemaker has failed to deliver furniture to at least eight people \u00e2\u20ac\u201d some for as long as 18 months \u00e2\u20ac\u201d the customers claim. The buyers combined […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4694","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-furniture-indonesia-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4694","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4694"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4694\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}