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ASSOCIATED PRESS
In this Feb. 13, 2016 file photo, Stevie Wonder performs at the Los Angeles Convention Center in Los Angeles, Ca.
A man accused of scamming the University of Hawaii of $200,000 for a Stevie Wonder concert that never happened is no longer planning to change his plea.
Marc Hubbard was scheduled to change his plea today. But court records show there will instead be a pretrial conference scheduled for next week.
He pleaded not guilty in 2013 to a wire fraud charge.
Authorities say the North Carolina concert promoter claimed he had connections to secure Wonder for an athletics fundraiser. The school paid a $200,000 deposit, began selling tickets and then learned neither Wonder nor his representatives authorized a show.
The incident was dubbed “Wonder Blunder.”
Court records say Hubbard pleaded guilty in South Carolina and New York to wire fraud and conspiracy charges. He’s also facing sentencing in Pennsylvania.
No one really likes being scammed.
Attorney fees alone probably cost double that amount.
The “Wonder Blunder” was just the tip of the utter incompetency iceberg at UH Manoa. Deadwood bureaucrats wasting students and taxpayer’s money, spending like drunken bureaucrats.
Fast forward to today, nothing has changed. Management deadwood given a massive pay raise for doing nothing. No cost reductions, no efficiency improvements, no reductions in tuition costs, nothing to reduce UH Manoa’s operational costs.
Just another day in the little 10th world of UH Manoa.
All sadly true. When you add up all the money wasted by the bumbling, incompetent administrators who have just decided to give themselves a pay raise for good work, I bet several buildings on the Manoa campus could have been fixed or vital resources purchased for students. Think wonderblunder, Gib Fib, the lies from Michele Carbone, the whole Cancer Center fiasco etc, etc. It is probably tens of millions of dollars that we pay in taxes and students pay in tuition that have been wasted.
Rather than plastering Stevie Wonder’s photo for this article (presumably to sensationalize things and get people to read the article), shouldn’t there be a photo of Mr. Hubbard instead?
Probably. I do get ill when I see that pic of of the birthmark on top of his head so I don’t mind the new imagery.
” The school paid a $200,000 deposit,…” Is the person(s) who approved and handed over taxpayers money also going to fry for this ? They had stars in their eyes and didn’t do their homework re:this scammer.
this is still going on????? how much is this all costing the taxpayers.
if you’re wondering whether it’s costing UH anything (more), I think probably not. it’s the US vs Marc Hubbard. it costs whatever it costs to put a criminal on trial in federal court.
This $200K is not under someone’s mattress and we can claw it back but was spent a long time ago…..a good time was had by all………..and we got had.