Cobra Collection Agency

It appears persistence and momentum does pay off.  WRBL News 3 finally paid attention to the Cobra Collection scam story on June 14, 2007.  However, they called it the “Cobra Collection Controversy“.  Boy, is that an understatement.  I liked WTVM’s title much better because it was more bold but also accurate.  In their broadcasts, they titled it a “business scam” and “collection scam”.

I don’t really know how the process of getting a local story on-air at all.  I have managed to stumble my way through the process a few times but it has always been a chaotic process.  But I am happy Janice Park of WRBL finally caught wind of it and decided to move on it.

She said my email sounded like I was angry with them (WRBL).  Actually, I was more frustrated because I didn’t understand why I got a poor response.  I thought there was so much put together and the client accounts of $6 million would be large enough.

I was thinking to myself, does Cobra Collections have have to blow up a building or the client accounts to reach $10 million to make the news?  If it wasn’t going to be a good story, why not? I simply wanted to know.

Anyhow, after scrambling around making calls, I provided Janice Park a list of people who would appear on camera to talk.  Steve Klemetti of Central Print & Signs and Nancy Wilhite of Dr. Jay Brodwyn’s office were both willing to help the cause.  I was grateful and they did a fantastic job.

In my interview with WRBL, I attempted to be concise.  As always, it was interesting to see what they would choose to air.  I looked like hell after standing in the sun sweating while talking to the cameraman.  But we finally came into my air-conditioned private office and knocked out the interview.

The June 14, 6pm airing was nice clocking at nearly 3 minutes, however the 11pm airing was a bit more disappointing.  Nevertheless, it was far more than we were getting before.  You could see my website CobraCollectionScam.com in the news story.

I asked Janice Park to be straight with me after I thanked her.  I said if this piece was done and did not warrant an update, I would not supply her any new information.  I had said the same thing to Zaneta Lowe of WTVM.  Fortunately, both reporters were open to updates.  So, for now, I have a direct line and email to the two reporters if there are any significant developments.

If any of you want to see the WRBL news story, you can see the video on WRBL.com and CobraCollectionScam.com.

Zaneta Lowe has quickly followed up on the heels of her June 1, 2007 story on Janice Ledden and the Cobra Collections story by doing a revisit and expansion of the original story.

In today’s story, Zaneta Lowe interviewed a previous landlord of Cobra Collections.  Additionally, she recapped the previous story while introducing my newest website, CobraCollectionScam.com.  You can view the news clip on that site.

CobraCollectionScam.com continues to grow with the surge of new reports and information coming in.  The stories has helped trigger 3 ex-employees to read the website and come forward.

Zaneta has once again done a great service to the local business community.

Two days ago local TV station WTVM Channel 9 got wind of the brewing Cobra Collections story here in the Columbus GA area.  Zaneta Lowe, reporter for WTVM, paid a visit to Janice Ledden and several “victimized” business customers.  I was one of those unhappy business customers.  I was informed that a fellow business associate, Lisa Mize, of Coldwell Banker Kennon, Parker, Duncan, & Key’s Rental Department, passed my name along as the keeper of the Cobra Collection Agency web page.

Zaneta Lowe left a message for me yesterday morning.  I returned her call around 1pm and she said she was doing a story that would appear at 5pm.  I thought to myself that was very quick but they were committed to doing it.  I informed Zaneta that she needed to be aware of the web page which had more complete information than any one person would know.

Initially, I did not plan to meet with her.  However, seeing as she was going to run the story, I thought I had to accommodate her.  They came over to my home and we sat discussing the situation and story.  While the cameraman was filming, the camera ran out of film which interrupted our flow.  Then, the camera ran low in battery power which caused another interruption.  I bring that up because I provided far more information than what was displayed on the aired story where I stumbled on my words.  I suppose you just never know what will make it on camera and what will be left behind.

In any case, the TV story meant that people are starting to take seriously the Cobra Collections situation I reported months ago.  Surprisingly, Janice Ledden volunteered to talk to Zaneta.  I suppose if she tried to avoid it, it would have made herself look worse.

In any case, the story was covered several times between Friday, June 1 and Saturday, June 2 on the various newscasts.  I was informed it also made it to the news FOX affiliate (and sister station) WXTX-54 broadcast at 10pm.  A good number of people I know saw the story.  I had no idea so many people watched the news.

The videos have been posted to the Cobra Collection Agency Scam website.