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Houston bride out $54K after venue 'ghosts' her day before wedding; is a notorious con-man behind it?

The Brief A Houston bride says she's out $54,000 after her wedding venue went unresponsive the day before her wedding. Other couples allege similar things have happened to them concerning the same venue operator. The host of the podcast 'The Wedding Scammer' claims this operator has conned multiple people across the country for years. MONTGOMERY COUNTY, Texas - A Houston bride says she showed up to locked doors and no lights at her $54,000 venue the day before her wedding for rehearsal, saying the man she booked with still won't return her calls. What we know Cyndi Ou spent 20 months preparing for her wedding day. "My husband worked so hard," she said. Charleston Lane in Willis, Texas was her dream venue. Open water and blue skies were going to be the picture-perfect backdrop. She provided a contract that shows she paid more than $52,000 to book the venue. Ou said the total spent was closer to $54,000 - all worth it for her dream wedding. But that dream came to a halt on May 16 when she and her wedding party showed up for rehearsal to locked doors, no lights, and unkept property. "When we all got there, the door was chained up and nobody was answering the front door," she said. Repeated calls to the operator of the venue went unanswered. "At that time my heart just sunk, and I realized that we had been tricked," she said. Ou says the operator had been on the phone with her just days prior confirming the rehearsal and ensuring that he would be present. Ou had to make the hard decision to book a new venue at the last minute and re-plan her entire wedding in 24 hours. "I mean seriously, I was in tears with my bride," said her wedding coordinator Charlize Cao. The backstory Cao says Ou booked the venue before she hired her, and it's something Cao wouldn't have advised because she's had a bad experience in the past. Cao says in 2023, she had a couple who booked the venue and were not satisfied with the service and never got their deposit back. She says it was the same situation; repeated tries to reach the operator with no success. "Completely ghosted, disappeared," she said. Kiet Nygyuen was the groom involved in the 2023 incident. He says they paid $3,500 for a flower arch and on the wedding day, that arch had no flowers. He says they brushed it off, but the real issue came with getting their deposit back. Nygyuen says he contacted the operator to get the $1,500 deposit back and was given multiple excuses over a series of weeks as to why he hadn't sent the money. Nygyuen says he decided to pick the check up himself. "I picked up the check and went home to cash the money, but that was an empty check. A fraud check," he said. He says after a few calls back and forth, the operator stopped picking up the phone. "I tried to file a lawsuit against him," said Nygyuen. But, he says the constables assigned to his case couldn't locate the operator. "He still owes me $1,500," he said. Several reviews online are posted by other couples who claim similar things have happened to them. Bounced checks, canceled weddings, and no response. Dig deeper Who is this operator? FOX 26 isn't reporting his name because no criminal charges have been filed. All the parties involved in this story gave us the same name, but we're told by Justin Sayles, a podcast host - that name might be an alias. Sayles claims he once worked for this operator at a startup business and that he never got paid for his work. He says he continued to track this person, eventually launching a podcast on his reporting, "The Wedding Scammer." "When I learned all the things that were happening, I thought it became so important to spread the word as far as we could," he said. The Podcast launched in 2023 and quickly became a hit, sitting at the third most popular podcast under 'The Joe Rogan Experience' at one point. "Millions of people have listened to this show and despite that he's been able to continue to operate," he said. In the series, Sayles alleges this operator has held many different positions in different states throughout the years, and Sayles successfully followed the trail here to Houston. Moving forward Alex Garcia says he is the new owner of the real estate associated with Charleston Lane in a rent-to-own agreement with the landlord. He says the property went up for sale in February, and he was excited about the investment opportunity. He says he never met the previous tenant, who was renting. "The tenant was not paying his rent, and he was evicted from the property," he said. Garcia says the operator never sent him any information or contracts regarding the weddings that were already booked at the venue once he took over. He says when he bought the place, it was clearly unkept and seemed abandoned. Then one day, the unexpected happened. "A bride and a whole family showed up to the place," he said. Garcia says it was a day he and his team were doing renovations, and he was just as shocked as the wedding party. Garcia says he and his team scrambled and did all they could to still host a wedding for the group. "It's a hard situation to be in, we have no information about these events," he said. Garcia says Charleston Lane is no more and that he did not acquire the business, only the property. He is re-naming the venue to "The Lake Venue". What's next FOX 26 contacted the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office about the allegations. They replied with this statement: "We haven't had a law enforcement agency present us with any charges connected to these allegations. The venue in question appears outside the Willis city limits, so individuals who wish to make a report can contact the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office for investigation." Ou says she has been in contact with the DA and urges anyone who had a similar experience to do the same. FOX 26 attempted to reach out to the operator by phone and email multiple times, but like those above who were involved, we haven't heard back. The Source FOX 26 Reporter Abigail Dye spoke with one victim about what happened as well as the new owner of the property.