More than a dozen Minnesota families are out thousands of dollars for pools that were never built, but some are getting financial relief.

Last year, Charles Workman, owner of MN Crete Pools LLC, was ordered to pay $1.1 million in restitution to his victims after the state’s attorney general obtained a default judgement in Scott County District Court for Workman’s deceptive pool construction scheme.

That money has yet to come from Workman.

But since obtaining the judgment, the state has obtained loan forgiveness from banks on behalf of multiple families who took out significant loans to pay the defendants. The office continues to pursue loan forgiveness for other families as well as collection of judgment against the defendants.

Kyle Swenson was among the victims who received money from the state’s actions.

“It took a few months,” said Swenson. “It was a battle.'

Swenson says his Maryland-based credit union made the partial loan forgiveness difficult.

'We were back and forth constantly with our vendor, they were fighting it tooth and nail,' Swenson said.

But the credit union finally forgave two-thirds of Swenson’s loan, so he will no longer have to make payments on it.

'It literally felt like a payday,” Swenson said. “We've been paying this loan every month, a very large sum of money to have nothing. So when that payment hit that bank account, we could see that balance shrink. It was a breath of fresh air. It was a weight off our back. It was the biggest win we could imagine.'

Another family was forgiven $25,000 from the same credit union, and two more had loans forgiven last summer. But there are plenty of others waiting to see if they will also get their money back.

While the Swensons are pleased to have been made partially whole, they feel that Workman should have been held accountable for restitution.

'That money has still been given to Charlie, and it's gone,” Swenson said. “So now we're just spreading that burden to another company, unfortunately, and he's now affecting more people. And that's not him paying us back. That's not restitution.”

Attorney General Ellison sued Workman and MN Crete Pools in August 2022 after alleging the company used a deceptive sales model to lure consumers into signing expensive pool installation contracts and paying a down payment of tens of thousands of dollars.

Workman pleaded not guilty when criminally charged with wire fraud in federal court. A March hearing in the criminal case was cancelled because of the anticipated plea. A new date has not yet been scheduled.