An Apex man who once ran a nonprofit training service dogs admitted Friday he defrauded the families he claimed to help.
Mark Christopher Mathis, 52, pleaded guilty to 50 counts of obtaining property by false pretense in Wake County Superior Court, according to a news release from Attorney General Jeff Jackson. Mathis owned Ry-Con Service Dogs, which purported to train service dogs for families “with medical or developmental needs,” the release said.
The scheme dated back to at least July 2013, according to the indictments. Mathis would charge families as much as almost $17,000 for dogs he claimed to specially train to work with their family members, but the dogs would arrive with little to no training, court documents state…