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HOW MUCH DOES IT OWE? $1.38 million
WHO’S INVOLVED: Harley Meservey, former president of Munitor
THE BACKSTORY: Meservey, 52, began Munitor Construction in 2001 and ran the business until it shut down in early 2023. Meservey, who owns a home in Coos Bay and another in Portland, says he closed the business in part because his former bookkeeper, Susan Baird-Bagley, who died in early 2020, embezzled more than $800,000 from Munitor over a span of two years.
It all went south, according to Meservey, when Baird-Bagley “got together with a guy who ended up being a child sex offender, a check fraud and a business fraud. It’s really unfortunate because she was a complete straight shooter, we never had any problems and had no reason to mistrust her.” (Court records show Baird-Bagley’s husband is indeed a sex offender and has a criminal history.)
Munitor sued Baird-Bagley’s estate and her husband after she died, alleging embezzlement. The filing alleges that the pair “caused or contributed substantially to Munitor incurring fees and penalties for nonpayment of payroll taxes.”
Meservey wants to leave Oregon because he’s “done” with it—he says homeless people routinely damaged his construction equipment. “When you go out and try to do your job and people break in and steal your stuff every day, you can’t make that money back,” he says.
Munitor has been sued 19 times since 2002, often by building materials companies alleging nonpayment for construction goods. A 2022 lawsuit alleges Meservey failed to pay $190,000 on a loan, and the Coos Bay Sheriff’s Office was ordered by the judge to collect the collateral—a number of construction trucks—from Meservey’s home. And a lawsuit filed just last week alleges he has failed to pay rent since December on two floating house slips at Jantzen Beach.
INTERESTING DETAIL: Meservey placed 82nd at a SCORE International Off-Road Racing competition in San Felipe, Mexico, in early April of this year. A YouTube video can be found of a dune buggy, driven by Meservey, racing over mounds of dirt at the same competition in 2021.
WHAT DOES HE SAY? Meservey says he’s working with the Department of Revenue to straighten out how much Munitor actually owes. Meservey says because the tax filings were filed improperly by the former bookkeeper, the state “just assumes a number and assigns it to you.” He estimates the amount he actually owes is “for sure more than zero” but “nowhere close to a million.”
WHAT THE BACK TAXES COULD BUY: 11,040 Narcan kits.