In July, Patrick Beck, 44, got the bad news that Chrysler Financial Corp. was shutting down his dealership in Nogales after 11 years. Yanira Valenzuela, 25, did not realize this meant bad news for her, too.

Yanira Valenzuela’s credit is at risk due to the closing of Patrick Beck’s auto dealership in Nogales in July.

In September, she received a call from Chase Bank telling her that she needed to come up with more than $700 by the end of October or risk being sent to collections. She could not come up with the money and her credit essentially is ruined.

A telephone message to Chase Bank for comment on this story went unanswered.

Valenzuela’s predicament stemmed from a trade-in transaction between herself and Pat Beck Dodge, Chrysler and Jeep. While the dealership took possession of a 2006 Chevy Cobalt she had purchased from Beck a year earlier, Beck never paid off the lien. Now, Valenzuela is legally obligated to pay that debt of about $7,200. She is also straddled with a payoff balance of about $16,000 for a 2006 Ford Fusion she purchased from the Nogales dealership.

Beck said he is sorting through his own business and personal financial issues. But there’s not much Valenzuela can do about hers. She is three-months pregnant and out of work. Her husband holds down two jobs as a waiter. But with rent, a $350-a-month car payment and other living expenses, she said it’s hard to make ends meet.

Nogales attorney Saji Vettiyil represented Valenzuela on a pro-bono basis initially, and plans to refer her case to the attorney general’s office.

“As a private attorney I do not have the ability to get her the remedy she deserves,” Vettiyil said. “It’s just not fair.”

Santa Cruz County Attorney George Silva said that Valenzuela is not alone in her plight with Pat Beck. His office has forwarded at least nine cases to the Arizona Attorney General’s Office.

He said the AG’s office in particular is investigating the case of Sandra Andrade, also of Nogales. AG Press Secretary Anne Titus Hilby said it is the office’s policy to neither confirm nor deny any ongoing investigation.

In an e-mail, Beck said, “I am working closely with Chrysler Financial in an effort to solve these few issues.

“The behavior of Chrysler Financial and their swift unreasonable decisions put my business and personal financial situation in a place where some of these liens could not be paid.

“For the most part, Chrysler Financial has taken possession of these vehicles and will then bear the responsibility of these payoffs. For any others, I have been in personal contact with the customers and will continue to work toward the solution.”

But what of the vehicles not financed through Chrysler? Sources in the automotive industry said that typically the dealer is responsible for resolving those situations.

Contacted at the Farmington Hills headquarters, Amber Gowen, communications specialist for Chrysler Financial, declined to comment about Pat Beck, citing “confidentiality and privacy issues.”

Meantime, Beck is involved in litigation with the state attorney general’s office regarding alleged deceptive advertising at a Phoenix dealership. The AG’s office filed the lawsuit just days before Chrysler Financial shuttered Beck’s Nogales dealership.

Specifically, the complaint alleges the Phoenix dealership, 2020 Automotive, “routinely advertised vehicles at artificially low prices from at least December 2006 and continuing through 2008. Once consumers came to the dealership and expressed an interest in buying an advertised vehicle, 2020 Automotive would refuse to sell the vehicle at the advertised price.

“Instead, 2020 Automotive would tell consumers they were required to purchase certain “dealer add-ons,” the existence and cost of which were not disclosed” in their advertising.

Also named in the suit are partners Leonard Diaz and Abraham Bekelian.

If you believe that you have been a victim of fraud, contact the Attorney General’s Office in Phoenix at at 1(800) 352-8431, or visit: http://www.azag.gov/AllComplaints.html.