Fraud by the book

By the summer of 2003, Matthew Cox had left a colorful mark in Tampa, Florida—from the murals that sprawled through his apartment building, to his manuscript for a novel about real estate fraud.

From Cox’s novel: If everyone was going to treat him like a criminal, then it was damn sure time he started acting like one.

Then there were his dozens of mortgage-maxxed homes and buildings, his Audi TT sportscar, and designer clothes.

And by Cox’s side was a woman who thought she was living the fairy tale dream: Alison Arnold. He felt like the modern-day Robin Hood. He would steal from the rich and give to the poor. That was his thing and I believed in him.

Of course, Alison Arnold wanted to believe—enough to succumb to his advances, leave her husband and break the law, as she says Cox had taught her. She filed false paperwork to make it appear a mortgage was paid off, then pulled out hundreds of thousands of dollars and leaving lenders holding the bag.

She wanted it. But—

Keith Morrison, Dateline correspondent: Was he able to make your life successful?

Alison Arnold: No, he always just paid my mortgage. He just gave me enough to make a car payment.

Morrison: It sounded like he was controlling your life at this point?

Arnold: I was totally dependent on him for everything.

She was living HIS fantasy, she says. Her life?  Her son? It didn’t matter to him—

Arnold: He liked feeling like he was living in a movie. He wanted me to be the “Bonnie and Clyde” with him. He’s like, why don’t you just leave your son? And I said, “No I can never leave my son.”

Surely he would understand that. She was, of course, wrong.

From his book: It was apparent that if you were not with Christian, you were against him.

And here was the consequence: Alison had been replaced.

Rebecca Hauck: He answered my ad. He was very charming. He was funny.

Matthew Cox found Rebecca Hauck on Match.com. There, right away, she  confessed she was new in town, a single mother with a son named Bryce, that she was on the run from an addiction to video poker. 

She was insecure.  She was vulnerable. She was perfect.

He took her to dinner where they hit it off.

Morrison: So what did Matthew tell you that he did?

Hauck: He told me he owned his own company, he had about 20 people that worked for him that thought he was a god and they all wanted to be his friend.

Rebecca was dazzled.  When he asked her out again, she said, of course.  He took her to a movie: “Matchstick Men.”

Hauck: He couldn’t wait for us to get out of the movie because he said, that’s small potatoes. And I’m like, what are you talking about? And then he proceeded to tell me he was on probation for mortgage fraud…

Morrison: When he told you that, what did you think?

Hauck: Well, I thought he was on probation. I thought, "Okay y’know he said it happened two years ago."

Morrison: But he’s talking about how he breaks the law!

Hauck: I know, I know. I thought, “Who am I to judge?” You know, everybody has a past.

There was something about him that irresistible.  And he seemed to see just what he wanted in her.

Hauck: He hit me hard and fast as far as like wining and dining me.

Morrison: Do you think you seemed needy?

Hauck: As he got to know me more, yes. He told my son that he was gonna put him in private school. He was building condos and he was gonna let he and I live in a condo and let my son live in one below it by himself… and…

Morrison: You had been poor? And now you were going to be rich!

Hauck: I know. I had diamonds. I had a Rolex. He’d just give me cash for whatever I wanted my prince charming.

Rebecca Hauck was mesmerized by these amazing stories: how to beat the system, get rich, and not hurt a living soul.

Hauck: He told me that his friend and him would create people. He’d make up a name, make up a fake Social Security number and so they’d get all these credit cards in fake names buy all this stuff and never pay it.

Morrison: You must have realized it was not legal.

Hauck: Oh yeah, I did.

Morrison: Was that not a problem?

Hauck: It was but by the time he started approaching me with this, I was so consumed with him.

Rebecca Hauck says she believed every word and salivated about wealth like she’d never experienced before. Neither she, nor Matthew Cox, apparently, was aware that around Tampa a buzz was growing about federal investigations. The law was on Cox’s trail once again. 

And then one day, a tip off.

Hauck: Someone who wrote for the paper sent his partner an article saying, “we’re on to you…”

Morrison: This was gonna be in the paper?

Hauck: Yeah. And he knew he was already on probation.

But here’s the twist that’s truly bizarre: Cox the aspiring novelist had written passages years earlier that he now seemed to be living almost word for word in real life.

Novel excerpt: Panic set in for the first time. How in the hell had the FBI gotten involved? Someone must’ve tipped them off. But who?

Hauck: He wouldn’t go back to his house because he was afraid they’d pick him up there if he was gonna get picked up again, he was going to prison..

Matthew Cox was about to ask that same question again, the one he’d asked Alison Arnold.

Hauck: He’s like, “Will you come with me?”

And this time the answer would be yes.

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