Warren County Prosecutor Richard Burke said Wednesday his office has not gotten involved, as no indications of criminal activity have been brought forward.
Local authorities are not pursuing criminal charges against the Phillipsburg oil company that suddenly closed its doors in November.
Meanwhile, stories of paying customers left in the cold continue to surface.
Officials at Holy Trinity Lutheran Church in West Bethlehem said today they are scrambling to find a way to heat a church-owned apartment building after prepaying Norton Oil Co. more than $26,000 and receiving almost nothing in return.
“We’re not going to let our renters go without heat,” David Ruhf, a member of the church’s property committee and chairman of the apartment board, said Wednesday. “But how are we going to pay for oil? I don’t know because we already paid $26,000. It is very frustrating for all of us.”
A woman who answered the door Wednesday at company President Richard Norton's Palmer Township house said he was unavailable.
Warren County officials said Tuesday more than 150 complaints have been lodged against Norton Oil since the company closed without reimbursing prepaid customers money or making good on service contracts. State officials are also gathering information, officials said, in the event of possible litigation.
A spokesman from the New Jersey state Attorney General’s Office did not return a message seeking comment on whether a state criminal investigation is being considered.
County Prosecutor Richard Burke said Wednesday his office has not yet gotten involved in the matter as no indications of criminal activity have been brought forward.
“If information comes to our attention that appears there may be criminal activity, we will certainly look into it from there,” he said.
Holy Trinity said the church is still mulling what its legal options might be.
According to Ruhf, the Third Avenue church forked over $26,000 in June for 8,000 gallons of oil meant to heat the church’s six-apartment building for the winter. Sitting across the parking lot from the church, the apartment building’s tenants are low-income families, mostly comprising women, he said.
With its last delivery to the building Nov. 15, Ruhf said, Norton Oil gave the church less than $1,300 worth of oil it had paid for. The remaining roughly $24,700 appears to be gone, he said.
When the church called Norton Oil to inquire about the oil shortly after the closing, a message directed them to Sycamore Co., Ruhf said. Workers there, however, said they could not deliver to Pennsylvania.
With oil supplies already running low, the church was forced to cough up another $700 on Monday to keep the heat in the building. In the weeks ahead, Ruhf said, he’s not sure where the money is going to come from.
“Basically we have to come up with another $26,000,” he said. “I don’t know how many churches can bite the bullet for $52,000 without it hurting.”
Unsure what will happen moving forward, Ruhf said, the worst-case scenario is the church may be forced to sell the apartment building that has given shelter to some of the area's needy for years.
"We have no avenue to raise additional money other than going through the congregation and asking them for additional monies," he said.
The most frustrating part about the situation, Ruhf said, is he believes Norton Oil knew the company was headed under when it took the church’s money.
“They had to know they were thinking about closing their doors when they accepted our $26,000,” he said. “This wasn’t something that just popped up. That’s what really has me frustrated. They should have been forthright with us.”