Businessman pleads guilty to 9 felonies

Staff report

WARREN

Lashawn Ziegler, a local businessman who operated two controversial taverns in the city, has pleaded guilty to nine felony charges related to automobiles and drugs.

They are one count of insurance fraud, two counts of receiving stolen property, three counts of tampering with records, and single counts of falsification, marijuana possession and marijuana trafficking.

Ziegler, 38, of North Park Avenue, pleaded guilty to the charges Friday in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court. He will be sentenced after the Trumbull County Adult Probation Department conducts a presentence investigation.

Ziegler could get more than 20 years in prison when Judge W. Wyatt McKay sentences him in four to six weeks. He remains free on bond.

Five of the nine charges stem from a BMW automobile Ziegler reported stolen in Youngstown on Feb. 8, 2008. Ziegler claimed to have paid $9,000 for the car but reported it worth $35,000 when he filed an insurance claim, prosecutors said. Ziegler also fraudulently obtained an Ohio title for the car, prosecutors said.

Police found the BMW at Ziegler’s home on Parkwood Drive Northwest when they went there with a search warrant in March 2008.

They also found a 2007 Chevrolet Corvette there for which Ziegler had obtained a fraudulent Ohio title, prosecutors said.

Police also found marijuana, firearms and $13,123 in cash in the home. Ziegler will forfeit the $13,123 to the court.

Ziegler owned the 77 Soul night club on Youngstown Road, which was closed for building violations, and later ran Benji Brown’s Bar and Grill on North Park Avenue, which was raided in April 2008 and found to be operating with no liquor permit. The tavern was also the site of a homicide in July 2007.