Former Fond du Lac business owner and State Assembly candidate facing identity theft charges – KFIZ News-Talk 1450 AM

A Fond du Lac man is accused of using fraudulently acquired credit cards to rack up nearly $25,000 in debt at the expense of a trusting business associate that thought she was going into a legitimate business with the man.

Lawrence Foster gained the trust of two local women to go into a video/photography business with him, and after making them “part of the business” allegedly used their personal information to get what he called credit cards for the business for each of them that would be linked to the same account.

Foster, however, didn’t open an account for all three of them. He successfully opened two lines of credit for one of the business partners and tried with the other, but their card applications were turned down.

Foster then proceeded to make $25,000 in charges to the two credit cards in the woman’s name for expenses not relating to the business.

Through investigating, it was found that a portion of that money was used to pay off other Fond du Lac businesses that Foster had over charged tens of thousands of dollars in a separate business Foster owned for website building, with the credit cards of the businesses on file in Foster’s possession. Foster claims it was a software error that caused the multiple transactions on the businesses cards.

Foster also used money obtained from those transactions to pay off debts acquired in his downtown Fond du Lac business Gathered Roots. A variety retail store that had a heavy inventory of local goods and products that has since closed down.

In addition to the four charges of identity theft related to the fraudulently acquired cards and attempted access to obtain cards from Foster’s business partners, he also faces another charge of unauthorized use of an entity’s information for again charging another local business’s credit card that Foster had on file for his website business. Similar to what was described as a “software error” with other companies he had dealings with.

Foster, who had failed campaign runnings for Fond du Lac City Council in 2021 and Wisconsin State Assembly in 2022, has his initial appearance for the most recent charges May 28th.