COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- Darian Hopkins is facing identity theft and criminal conspiracy theft charges in El Paso County, but these felony charges against him are nothing new.
Hopkins, 45, owns Final Stop Inc., a contracting company, according to the Colorado Secretary of State. In court documents, he allegedly uses his company as a way to steal money from victims.
In October 2022, Hopkins offered Sherrie Patterson an investment opportunity. He told her if she could provide more than $6,000 for a construction project in Aurora, she would receive a large return. Patterson agreed and sent him the money.
Over the course of the next month, Patterson invested more than $20,000 in Hopkins’ company, but she said she never received any money in return.
The court documents also said Hopkins set up a CashApp account under the identity of a man living in Arizona to accept money from Patterson.
“This is a lesson to everybody that just because someone has a business card doesn't mean they are a legitimate business,” said Jeremy Loew, a criminal defense attorney in Colorado Springs.
Previous criminal cases show this is Hopkins’ M-O. He entices people to invest in some business venture and then never pays a return as he promises.
It’s what happened to multiple people in Denver. According to open cases out of Denver and Arapahoe Counties, Hopkins’ used his company to get two victims to invest more than $10,000 each.
The Denver District Attorney’s Office said “Mr. Hopkins misrepresented to his investors the nature of Hopkins’ businesses,” according to court records. The Office also said Hopkins failed to “disclose to the investors his substantial criminal history, that he was on parole when he solicited the investments, his outstanding monetary judgments, his obligations to other investors, that investor funds would be used to pay for items unrelated to the agreements, and that Mr. Hopkins was not a signatory on the account into which Mrs. Joyce’s funds were deposited.”
“You're really a buyer beware with your investments,” Loew said. “The best thing you can do before you invest any kind of money with somebody is do a little background check.”
If victims did a background check, they would have found Hopkins has felony charges related to theft and forgery in multiple counties dating back to 2000. He’s pleaded guilty to several of those charges and has monetary judgments totaling more than $34,000, according to court records. These judgments include fines, fees, and restitution related to his criminal convictions.
In fact, Hopkins could have still been in prison when he allegedly stole from his Denver victims. In 2019, he was sentenced to four years for identity theft. However, after one year he was released on parole. He then committed five other fraud-related crimes while on parole.
“Sometimes people spend their time in prison, instead of rehabilitating themselves, thinking of ways that they can continue to defraud the community when they get out,” Loew said.
13 Investigates reached out to Hopkins on Facebook and called his company’s number but he didn’t answer. Last week, he pleaded guilty to theft and forgery in his two open Denver County cases. He is facing up to 12 years in prison and will be sentenced in October.
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August 15, 2023 at 04:47AM
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Alleged serial con artist wanted in Colorado Springs for theft charges - KRDO
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