Shrewsbury Estate Bilked Out Of Nearly $200K In Gold Coin Case: Feds

SHREWSBURY, MA — A man is facing charges for buying nearly $200,000 worth of gold coins from a Shrewsbury estate with bad checks, then selling many of the coins to pawn shops, according to a statement from federal prosecutors.

William Dawson, 51, of Connecticut, was arrested Wednesday and indicted by a federal grand jury in Worcester on one count of interstate transportation of property taken by fraud.

According to prosecutors, Dawson represented himself as a property buyer and reseller. Around December 2022, a cleanout business operator was hired to do an estate cleanout in Shrewsbury.

The cleanout business operator had found 170 Queen Elizabeth II Canadian Gold Maple Leaf Coins, collectively worth approximately $290,000. The estate approved selling 120 of those gold coins to Dawson.

In January, Dawson met with the cleanout business owner in Millbury and bought the 120 gold coins with two checks totaling $198,800. However, prosecutors alleged that Dawson had significantly less than $198,800 in the bank account when he wrote the checks.

The same day, Dawson is accused of calling the cleanout business owner and claiming that his car was broken into and the gold coins stolen. Dawson then traveled to a Pawtucket, RI pawn shop where he sold 43 of the gold coins in exchange for $80,442. On several occasions in February, Dawson traveled to a Cranston, RI pawn shop where sold 19 more of the gold coins for about $35,094, prosecutors said.