Sign shop owner could face more theft charges

Facebook page details numerous claims against Taylor McKemberly, 49

SAN ANTONIO – It appears that Taylor Jeffrey McKemberly, a North Side sign shop owner accused of conning customers out of their money, could face additional charges, based on some of the accusations made on the Internet.

An entire Facebook page is devoted to stories from people who claim the 49-year-old self-described businessman took their money, but failed to deliver on the work he promised.

A ticker at the top of that page claims that the combined total the alleged victims have lost to McKemberly is close to $90,000.

At this time, he faces charges in connection with claims made by a Northeast Sside company, and a Spring Branch woman earlier this year.

Affidavits related to those charges state that one of the alleged victims hired him to repair signs outside two locations of a business, while the other wanted him to install a wraparound sign on an RV.

The affidavit stated that both of them said that after paying money but seeing no work being done, they conducted an Internet search and found more claims against McKemberly.

Leslie Holt works for a North Side company and said her employer also filed a report with San Antonio police after McKemberly failed to deliver on a job in January to build them a sign.

"And then he says, 'Oh we do gates. Do you want us to do a gate?' And so that was another down-payment," Holt said. "We fell for it, and he took us out for a lot of money."

All told, she said, her employer paid McKemberly about $5,400 and got nothing in return.

Dozens of people have posted comments to the Facebook page as well as other sites that allow reviews of businesses. Many of them are negative.

McKemberly has a long criminal record that includes arrests for theft in three different states. The record also shows he has about a half-dozen aliases.


About the Author

Katrina Webber joined KSAT 12 in December 2009. She reports for Good Morning San Antonio. Katrina was born and raised in Queens, NY, but after living in Gulf Coast states for the past decade, she feels right at home in Texas. It's not unusual to find her singing karaoke or leading a song with her church choir when she's not on-air.

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