Former Ridgeland woman pleads guilty to fraud, ordered to pay $18,000 in restitution

By LeAnn R. Ralph

MENOMONIE  —  A 24-year-old former Ridgeland woman charged with fraud and identity theft has pleaded guilty and has been ordered to pay $17,823 in restitution.

Tiffany M. Hobbick appeared in Dunn County Circuit Court March 22 for a sentencing hearing before Judge James Peterson. 

Hobbick pleaded guilty to fraud against a financial institution and misappropriating an identity to obtain money in Dunn County Circuit Court December 29.

Judge Peterson withheld sentence and placed Hobbick on four years of probation. As a condition of probation, Hobbick was sentenced to six months in jail, broken up into three parts, to report by 5 p.m. January 1 in 2018, 2019 and 2020 for two months in jail each year. 

Hobbick’s attorney, Christopher Stephen Petros, requested that Hobbick report to jail after the due date of her baby.

Some of the restitution was ordered to be paid with a co-defendant in the case, Tiffany Hobbick’s husband, Ryan Hobbick.

Hobbick also was ordered to make a good-faith effort to obtain a General Equivalency Diploma, to obtain employment and to go into Moral Reconation Therapy, a treatment program designed to decrease recidivism by increasing moral reasoning. 

Hobbick’s husband, 38-year-old Ryan Hobbick, was sentenced in May of 2016 to three years in prison and five years of extended supervision for a burglary at A-Z Auto & Truck Salvage & Recycling Center on state Highway 29 near Elk Mound.

A Dunn County jury found Ryan Hobbick guilty of burglary following a one-day trial in February of 2016.

At the time of the Town of Elk Mound burglary, Tiffany and Ryan Hobbick lived in Ridgeland.

Miles J. Gloss, Tiffany Hobbick’s uncle, pleaded guilty in April of 2015 to one felony count of burglary related to items stolen from A-Z Auto & Truck Salvage & Recycling Center and agreed to testify against others implicated in the burglary.

Gloss was sentenced to probation and 120 days in the county jail, but his probation was later revoked, and he was sentenced to four years in state prison.

Gloss and Ryan Hobbick also were charged with multiple felony charges of theft and burglary in Chippewa County in connection with thefts from businesses and construction sites totaling more than $60,000.

Stevie Walls Sr., Tiffany Hobbick’s father, and Stevie Walls Jr. also were charged in connection with the thefts from A-Z Auto Salvage.

During the jury trial for Ryan Hobbick, Michael Larson, Wayne Larson’s son, testified that his father had operated A-Z for 25 years, and that since his father’s death, he has gone out to check the property.

Larson testified that one day when he went to check on the property, he noticed that someone had changed the padlock on the front gate.

David Bolgren, an investigator for Menards, testified that $15,798 worth of merchandize had been ordered by the deceased Wayne Larson, including gift cards, a mattress, a rocker-recliner, copper pipe and  “rose mauve” paint.

According to the criminal complaint, a search warrant was executed at the home of Ryan and Tiffany Hobbick in Ridgeland on December 15, 2014.

Law enforcement officers seized receipts from Menards totaling $5,377 in copper tubing and parts ordered from the Eau Claire Menards West; $3,896 in copper tubing and parts ordered from the Rice Lake Menards; $1,698 in furniture and personal products from Eau Claire Menards East; and a $2,000 $2,000 Menards gift card to be delivered to the Hobbick address in the name of Michael Johnson.