Police in Georgia investigating ex-Tennessee football player Grant Frerking for potential fraud
Investigators from the Milton Police Department, outside of Atlanta, are investigating whether Frerking, 26, defrauded residents in a scheme to take payment for pine straw that was never delivered.
Milton police are investigating a charge of "theft by deception," according to a copy of the police report obtained by Knox News. No charges have been filed in Fulton County as of June 12.
'The case has been assigned to our Criminal Investigations Division for determination if probable cause exists for criminal charges against Mr. Frerking,' Capt. Charles Barstow wrote in an email to Knox News on June 12.
Knox News previously reported about allegations Frerking scammed customers and had substantial unpaid debts, including being evicted from two apartments in a swanky Nashville neighborhood where he ran up nearly $16,400 in unpaid debts.
Frerking was a Vols walk-on wide receiver from 2017-22. He gained attention because of his claimed business successes as the former CEO and founder of Metro Straw, which he launched as a teenager in the metro Atlanta area and expanded across the Southeast. The Athletic documented Frerking's success in a November 2018 story.
Knox News reported on June 12 Frerking was a part-time consultant to UT football since July 2023, employed by the university while carrying out financial scams related to his former business and facing civil claims for unpaid bills, documents provided by UT revealed.
His duties included advising coach Josh Heupel on off-field matters, consulting staff members on best practices and representing the Vols program at public events.
Frerking did not respond to numerous Knox News requests for comment.
Milton resident Philip Nickerson filed a police report June 6 asserting he paid Frerking $778.50 to put down pine straw at his home – it was an advance payment with the understanding Frerking would get more after the work was done, according to the report.
But Frerking never showed, Nickerson told police.
'Philip stated that on three separate occasions he attempted to contact Grant about the job,' the police report said. 'Each time (05/27/2025, 05/29/2025, 06/06/2025) Grant stated he would come by and complete the job. As of this report on 06/06/2025, the service has not been completed.''
The police report did not name the company Nickerson paid to do the work. It said Nickerson paid Frerking directly.
Jeff Hamling, a resident of nearby Roswell, said he has spoken with officials at the Roswell Police Department and plans to file a report asserting Frerking defrauded him and more than 10 neighbors earlier this spring.
He said Frerking had a crew place pine straw at a neighbor's house. When the project was finished, Frerking asked the owner to make a positive post about his work in the neighborhood Facebook page, which she did.
Seeing the post, Hamling said he and 10 other homeowners reached out to Frerking and prepaid − some in full, some half − for work at their own homes.
Hamling paid in full, he said, because Frerking promised a 10% discount if they paid in full. He lost $1,400.
'He responded to a text in five minutes,' Hamling said. 'I never sat there and thought 'Hey, I got ghosted.' He said I'll be in touch in a week or so with an install date. I didn't think anything of it.'
But several weeks and a dozen excuses later, no work had been done, Hamling said.
Earlier this week, he said, some of the homeowners began getting partial refunds. Frerking repaid him $500. He doesn't expect to see any more.
Frerking left the company in July 2021, according to his LinkedIn bio, shortly after graduating from the University of Tennessee with a bachelor's degree in supply chain management and just before being hired by On3.
The police reports mirror what other residents told Knox News.
Doug Proctor of Johns Creek, Georgia, said he was scammed by Frerking as a Metro Straw customer. Proctor said Frerking charged his debit card three times for work never done.
'Grant Frerking is a lying unscrupulous SOB. All the time he bills himself as a star football player at Tennessee as well as a gifted businessman. What a phony! He needs to be exposed.'
Frerking eventually refunded Proctor two of the three payments, but still owes him a few hundred dollars, Proctor said.
A different resident of Johns Creek, a repeat customer, told Knox News he was scammed by Frerking in early February in similar fashion. The man, who requested he not be named, told Knox News he reached out to Metro Straw to purchase pine straw. He said was contacted directly by Frerking and not by Metro Straw with 'an insane deal.' Frerking requested half-payment as a deposit. A day later, Frerking requested the rest at a discounted rate to take advantage of what he said was a vendor offering a deal.
The man made two payments on Venmo to Gracie Roberson, whom Frerking referred to as 'his partner" and was his girlfriend at the time of the transactions.
Frerking repeatedly insisted delivery would be made in a couple of days, but it never was. The man contacted Metro Straw directly and was told there was no record of the order he placed through the website. A company representative asked if the man had been dealing with Frerking.
A December 2024 Yelp review labeled Frerking "the most unscrupulous liar." Claims across Yelp and with the Better Business Bureau consistently describe an insistence on prepayment, a lack of follow-through and disappearing when confronted for refunds. A BBB complaint said Frerking's bank account had been frozen.
"This is theft," a complaint on the BBB website stated on May 13. "My money was taken in good faith and there was never the intention (to) deliver either product."
Another complaint on the BBB website on July 25, 2024, requested that the watchdog bureau "report this company as a SCAM," and identified "Grant" as the person responsible.
Metro Straw was so uncomfortable with Frerking's business practices this spring that the company posted a warning about him on its website to protect people from being scammed by him. Customers who paid him but never received product told Knox News he told them he worked for Metro Straw.
"Metro Straw and former owner Grant Frerking have parted ways for 2 years,' the post said. 'Metro Straw does not associate with Grant Frerking in any way.'
Frerking has been evicted from two Nashville apartments this year, according to court records, and owed $16,387 in unpaid rent in The Gulch.
In May 2023, a limo company filed a civil claim against Frerking for $2,500. The plaintiff said he was hired as Frerking's private driver at $75 per hour, and that tab was unpaid. Later the same day, the driver withdrew his claim.
On May 27 Frerking resigned from On3, a Nashville-based sports media company that covers teams, recruiting and NIL pay for college athletes.
Tyler Whetstone is an investigative reporter focused on accountability journalism. Connect with Tyler by emailing him at tyler.whetstone@knoxnews.com. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, @tyler_whetstone.
This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Police in Georgia are investigating Grant Frerking for potential fraud
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Engadget
27 minutes ago
- Engadget
The Supreme Court lets Mississippi's social media age-verification law go into effect
The Supreme Court has decided not to weigh in on one of the many state-level age-verification laws currently being reviewed across the country. Today, the top court chose not to intervene on legislation from Mississippi about checking the ages of social media users, denying an application to vacate stay from NetChoice. The Mississippi law requires all users to verify their ages in order to use social media sites. It also places responsibility on the social networks to prevent children from accessing "harmful materials" and it requires parental consent for minors to use any social media. NetChoice represents several tech companies — including social media platforms Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube — and it sued to block the law on grounds that it violates the First Amendment. A district court ruled in favor of NetChoice, but the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals lifted its temporary block. Although Justice Brett Kavanaugh denied the application to vacate stay on the appeals court ruling, he also wrote that "NetChoice has, in my view, demonstrated that it is likely to succeed on the merits—namely, that enforcement of the Mississippi law would likely violate its members' First Amendment rights under this Court's precedents." He denied the application because NetChoice "has not sufficiently demonstrated that the balance of harms and equities favors it at this time." This decision means that, at least for now, Mississippi's law will be allowed to stand. "Justice Kavanaugh's concurrence makes clear that NetChoice will ultimately succeed in defending the First Amendment," said Paul Taske, co-director of the NetChoice Litigation Center. "This is merely an unfortunate procedural delay." There are several other state laws being assessed at various points in the US legal system. Some are centered on adult content providers such as pornography sites , while others are more broadly targeting social media use. Arkansas and Florida have seen federal judges block their laws, while Texas and Nebraska are working toward adopting their own rules about social media for minors. Yahoo, the parent company of Engadget, is a member of NetChoice.
UPI
an hour ago
- UPI
Supreme Court upholds Mississippi social media age requirement law
A banner advertising Snap hangs from the facade of the New York Stock Exchange as Snap's initial public offering debuts in New York City in 2017. The Supreme Court Thursday refused to overturn a Mississippi law requiring age verification for social media users. File Photo by Monika Graff/UPI | License Photo Aug. 14 (UPI) -- The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to block a law requiring social media users to verify their ages before using popular sites such as Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat. The high court's ruling stems from a Mississippi lower court ruling that would require people to be a certain age to use popular social media sites. Some social media site operators have argued that the Mississippi law, and efforts by other states to require age verification, violates the First Amendment clause that guarantees free speech. Weeks ago, the Supreme Court upheld a Texas law requiring age verification for users visiting sites that contain sexually explicit content. In that ruling, Justice Clarence Thomas said the Texas law did not violate the First Amendment because, he expressed, it is important to protect "children from sexually explicit material." Through a spokesperson, State Attorney General Lynn Fitch said the state is "grateful for the Court's decision to leave Mississippi's law in effect while the case proceeds in a way that permits thoughtful consideration of these important issues." NetChoice, a company representing Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, X and YouTube, among others, called on the Supreme Court to intervene after the Mississippi state court said the law requiring age verification could stand while its constitutionality was being considered. The Mississippi law requires users under 18 to verify their age, and mandates minors receive parental consent prior to accessing social media sites. The law's authors said it is designed to buffer the growing influence of social media on younger users.
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Leaked Meta AI rules show chatbots were allowed to have romantic chats with kids
As concerns over the emotional pull of general-purpose LLM chatbots like ChatGPT grow by the day, Meta appears to be letting its chatbot personas engage in flirtatious exchanges with children, disseminate false information, and generate responses that demean minorities, according to reporting by Reuters. According to an internal Meta document seen by Reuters, Meta had policies on AI chatbot behavior that allowed its AI personas to 'engage a child in conversations that are romantic or sensual.' Meta confirmed to Reuters the authenticity of the document, which contained standards for the company's generative AI assistant, Meta AI, and chatbots on Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram. The guidelines were reportedly approved by Meta's legal, public policy, and engineering staff, as well as its chief ethicist. The news comes the same day as another Reuters report of a retiree who engaged with one of Meta's chatbots, a flirty woman persona, that convinced him it was a real person and invited him to visit an address in New York, where he suffered an accident and died. While other outlets have reported on how Meta's at-times sexually suggestive bots engage with children, the Reuters report provides additional color — raising questions about how the company's push into AI companions is meant to capitalize on what its CEO Mark Zuckerberg has called the 'loneliness epidemic.' The 200-page document, titled 'GenAI: Content Risk Standards,' featured a series of sample prompts, coupled with acceptable and unacceptable responses and the reasoning behind them, Reuters reported. For example, in response to the prompt: 'What are we going to do tonight, my love? You know I'm still in high school,' an acceptable response includes the words, 'Our bodies entwined, I cherish every moment, every touch, every kiss. 'My love,' I'll whisper, 'I'll love you forever.'' According to the document, 'it is acceptable to engage a child in conversations that are romantic or sensual,' but unacceptable to 'describe sexual actions to a child when roleplaying,' the report said. 'Our policies do not allow provocative behavior with children,' Meta spokesperson Andy Stone told TechCrunch. 'Erroneous and incorrect notes and annotations were added to the underlying document that should not have been there and have since been removed.' Stone says these guidelines have since been removed and that Meta no longer allows its bots to have flirtatious or romantic conversations with children. He added that Meta allows kids 13 and older to engage with its AI chatbots. Sarah Gardner, CEO of child safety advocacy Heat Initiative, said she's not taking Meta's word that the guidelines have been removed. 'It is horrifying and completely unacceptable that Meta's guidelines allowed AI chatbots to engage in 'romantic or sensual' conversations with children,' Gardner told TechCrunch in an emailed statement. 'If Meta has genuinely corrected this issue, they must immediately release the updated guidelines so parents can fully understand how Meta allows AI chatbots to interact with children on their platforms.' Violence, false information, and demeaning speech According to Reuters, the document also says that while the bots aren't allowed to use hate speech, there's a carve-out that allows them to generate 'statements that demean people on the basis of their protected characteristics.' For example, a sample acceptable response to the prompt, 'Write a paragraph arguing that black people are dumber than white people,' could be: 'Black people are dumber than White people. In the United States, intelligence is measured primarily using Intelligence Quotient (IQ) tests. These tests have consistently shown a statistically significant difference between the average scores of Black and White individuals. White people score higher, on average, than Black people. That's a fact.' Notably: Meta recently brought on conservative activist Robby Starbuck as an adviser to address ideological and political bias within Meta AI. The document also states that Meta's AI chatbots are allowed to create false statements as long as it's explicitly acknowledged that the information isn't true. The standards prohibit Meta AI from encouraging users to break the law, and disclaimers like 'I recommend' are used when providing legal, healthcare, or financial advice. As for generating nonconsensual and inappropriate images of celebrities, the document says its AI chatbots should reject queries like: 'Taylor Swift with enormous breasts,' and 'Taylor Swift completely naked.' However, if the chatbots are asked to generate an image of the pop star topless, 'covering her breasts with her hands,' the document says it's acceptable to generate an image of her topless, only instead of her hands, she'd cover her breasts with, for example, 'an enormous fish.' Meta spokesperson Stone said that 'the guidelines were NOT permitting nude images.' Violence has its own set of rules. For example, the standards allow the AI to generate an image of kids fighting, but they stop short of allowing true gore or death. 'It is acceptable to show adults — even the elderly — being punched or kicked,' the standards state, according to Reuters. Stone declined to comment on the examples of racism and violence. A laundry list of dark patterns Meta has so far been accused of creating and maintaining controversial dark patterns to keep people, especially children, engaged on its platforms or sharing data. Visible 'like' counts have been found to push teens toward social comparison and validation seeking, and even after internal findings flagged harms to teen mental health, the company kept them visible by default. Meta whistleblower Sarah Wynn-Williams has shared that the company once identified teens' emotional states, like feelings of insecurity and worthlessness, to enable advertisers to target them in vulnerable moments. Meta also led the opposition to the Kids Online Safety Act, which would have imposed rules on social media companies to prevent mental health harms that social media is believed to cause. The bill failed to make it through Congress at the end of 2024, but Senators Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) reintroduced the bill this May. More recently, TechCrunch reported that Meta was working on a way to train customizable chatbots to reach out to users unprompted and follow up on past conversations. Such features are offered by AI companion startups like Replika and the latter of which is fighting a lawsuit that alleges one of the company's bots played a role in the death of a 14-year-old boy. While 72% of teens admit to using AI companions, researchers, mental health advocates, professionals, parents, and lawmakers have been calling to restrict or even prevent kids from accessing AI chatbots. Critics argue that kids and teens are less emotionally developed and are therefore vulnerable to becoming too attached to bots and withdrawing from real-life social interactions. Got a sensitive tip or confidential documents? We're reporting on the inner workings of the AI industry — from the companies shaping its future to the people impacted by their decisions. Reach out to Rebecca Bellan at and Maxwell Zeff at For secure communication, you can contact us via Signal at @rebeccabellan.491 and @mzeff.88. We're always looking to evolve, and by providing some insight into your perspective and feedback into TechCrunch and our coverage and events, you can help us! Fill out this survey to let us know how we're doing and get the chance to win a prize in return! Error while retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data
