Nesbit, MS - 25 year-old Ashley Wagner spent her weekend in a daze. She's devastated after learning the Bonne Terre Country Inn and Cafe in Nesbit, Mississippi is closed.
Wagner was supposed to be married there in September. But the hotel suddenly went out of business last week and owner Charles Orr is gone along with Ashley's $5600 deposit.
"I couldn't function when I found out," says Wagner. "I cried my eyes out and called my girlfriend and told her I don't know what I'm going to do or where I'm going to go from here. My entire wedding plan has been flushed down the toilet."
"That man is low down," says Wagner's fiance, 24 year-old Michael Lemay. "He likes to steal money from people and that's wrong. To me, he's scum and I'll say it."
Wagner says when her mom finally reached Orr on the phone, he had no sympathy for her or the other couples who put their matrimonial hopes and money in his hands.
"His only response," says Wagner, "was talk to my lawyer."
"I'm in shock," says Kirk Houston, the owner of the Mid-South Wedding Show in Germantown. "I mean, I've been in this industry for 20 years and I've never seen a situation handled in such a poor manner."
Houston says no one in the industry suspected any trouble at Bonne Terre. But after Ashley's story started making the rounds in an e-mail Houston sent to vendors, offers of help came pouring in to the couple.
"I'm not talking about mom and pop operations either," says Houston. "I've heard from the manager of the Peabody, the Marriott and the Crowne Plaza. The folks at the Whispering Woods Hotel and Convention Center in Olive Branch were the first to call. People have offered facilities, wedding cakes, photographers and hotel rooms. And they're offering these services for free."
And that generosity has lessened Ashley and Michael's pain and frustration.
"In this economy," says Lemay, "the outreach coming to us is unreal. At a time when people are struggling for business and we get all of these offers, it's just unreal. And we are so appreciative."
Ashley, a bit overwhelmed, has to start from scratch now. She's been left in the lurch, she says, by a cold-hearted businessman who just filed Chapter 7 bankruptcy.
"I don't know him personally," says Wagner, "so I can't judge him. But he hurt a lot of people."
But thanks to the kindness of strangers, her big day may wind up being even more memorable than she or Michael ever imagined.
"I think Ashley is going to have her dream wedding," says Houston, "and it will be better than it would have been at Bonne Terre because the services for her wedding are being given by the heart and not by the checkbook."
Calls from Eyewitness News to Charles Orr and his attorney went unanswered on Monday, January 12, 2009.
Orr and his wife, Kimbel, managed a hotel in Florida for more than 10 years before buying Bonne Terre in 2005 from its' original owner, Max Bonnin.
The Orrs have until January 22nd to file the appropriate paperwork in their bankruptcy claim. If they do not meet the deadline, the case will be dismissed.
