Shanadoa Wayne Johnson

Francis Petersen was standing at the end of his long driveway in La Pine when he was approached by a friendly man with an offer. The man said he was a contractor and he had some asphalt left over from his last job. Would Petersen like his driveway repaved at a discount?

Fast forward several years and $45,000 — what Petersen ended up paying to repave his driveway — and he admits he never should have said yes.

Today, weeds grow through numerous cracks in the still-unfinished driveway.

“I’d never had any asphalt job done before so I didn’t have any knowledge of what it should cost,” said Petersen, 86. “Toward the end of the job I looked up on the internet and saw that he charged me twice what it should have cost.”

Petersen is hardly alone. What he experienced was a textbook paving scam, one of the most common ways homeowners are defrauded in the U.S., according to the Better Business Bureau.

The self-styled contractor who took Petersen for a ride in the summer of 2019, identified in court documents as Shanadoa “Shaun” Wayne Johnson, is alleged to be responsible for scams far broader than just Deschutes County, court records show. He has other open cases in Klamath and Lane counties and is suspected of crimes in California and Nevada, according to the Klamath County Sheriff’s Office, which warned residents about Johnson in August and November.

In October 2019, Johnson showed up in the driveway of Bend woman Janette Green. According to an indictment in Deschutes County Circuit Court, he told her he would repave her driveway and later obtained a signature from her by misrepresenting that he had finished the job. A month later, he allegedly made off with thousands of dollars from Green, and attempted to defraud another Bend resident, according to court documents.

After that, Johnson reportedly headed south to Klamath Falls, where in August, an 86-year-old woman told police that Johnson began a sealant job on her driveway, and after accepting a partial payment of $800, never returned to finish it, according to a Klamath County Sheriff’s Office report.

That same month Klamath Falls couple Gary and Pamela Sims told deputies a man named Shaun approached them in their driveway and struck up a conversation, according to documents filed in Klamath County Circuit Court that identify Shaun as Johnson. They’d recently taken a bid from an asphalt contractor to repave their driveway but were told the contractor couldn’t get started for approximately six months. The man in their driveway, however, told them he could get started right away and the job would only cost $800.

Johnson started working and a half-hour later, an unidentified woman associated with him confronted the couple with a bill for $6,000, court documents state. The woman said that although $800 was the cost they’d discussed, they hadn’t factored in equipment and labor costs. The couple gave Johnson a check for $4,000.

After Johnson left, the Sims made a troubling discovery.

“The Sims quickly discovered that Shanadoa Johnson did not seal coat their driveway and instead merely painted it black,” court documents state.

In addition to criminal allegations, Johnson is the subject of numerous complaints with Oregon’s Construction Contractors Board, including one from Petersen of La Pine. Consumers typically settle disputes with contractors through the board, which licenses contractors, but because Johnson isn’t licensed, his alleged victims don’t have that option.

Prolific scammers are often well-known to the agency’s investigators, though there’s little they can do, said Stan Jessup, board enforcement manager.

“Every year we catch several of the pavers from out of state and cite them. However, the limit of our authority is to fine the offender,” Jessup said.

An Oregon law last updated in 2007 makes it a crime to contract without a license, though it’s a Class A misdemeanor and is very seldom prosecuted, Jessup said.

Jessup said legitimate contractors almost never have asphalt left over from a job.

“It happens every year here in Oregon,” Jessup said of paving scams. “A lot of time the tipoff is the out-of-state plates, and the shiny, new equipment. And they blow into an area and stay in motels or RV parks and kind of concentrate on the rural areas of a state.”

Beyond asking if a contractor is licensed and bonded, Jessup recommends looking up a contractor on the Construction Contractors Board’s website, taking a picture of the contractor’s ID card and never paying cash. Credit card payments are best because a buyer can later dispute the charges.

But basically, Jessup said, never trust someone who wants to get rid of asphalt.

“If a contractor’s walking up to you unannounced, that’s a red flag right there,” Jessup said.

Petersen’s complaint against Johnson never wound up in court, but in August, Johnson was charged by a Deschutes County grand jury with defrauding Green, and a warrant issued for his arrest — the third warrant by an Oregon jurisdiction.

Johnson’s whereabouts were unknown at the time, but a tip to the Klamath County Sheriff’s Office in November resulted in his arrest and detention in the Cowlitz County jail in Washington.

Deschutes County officials requested that he be extradited to Bend to face charges in Green’s case but were denied due to COVID-19 protocols. Instead, Johnson was released from custody, and on Tuesday, he failed to appear at an arraignment in Bend.

A judge issued another warrant for Johnson’s arrest, but his whereabouts are unknown.