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Northshore woman gave away millions to unknowingly fund gambling habit of hairdresser's daughter

“It was $10,000 here and $5,000 here and it just kept going and going and going...I could barely keep my head above water," said 73-year-old Ronda Behrens.

Katie Moore / WWL Louisiana Investigator

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Published: 6:20 PM CDT May 16, 2024
Updated: 6:20 PM CDT May 16, 2024

After more than a decade of helping to fund two civil lawsuits filed by her hairdresser’s daughter, a Northshore woman said she was shocked to discover last year that the money was really bankrolling a gambling habit.

Ronda Behrens, 73, started loaning money to Melissa Ficarra Kagel in 2006. At that time, Behrens’ real estate business was booming, a windfall that resulted from Hurricane Katrina.

She won business awards and was a leader in the Northshore real estate community.

“I had money. I had a lot of money. And I'm a believer in what goes around comes around, Behrens said.

Kagel told her she needed money to help fund two Ficarra family lawsuits. One was a personal injury case against her father’s insurance company, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Louisiana, and the other was a lawsuit over the botched sale of a family business, Seagos Starting Systems and Services, LLC.

In exchange for the loans, Behrens said Kagel promised her a piece of the expected multi-million-dollar lawsuit settlements.

A stack of handwritten IOUs, now tucked into a banker’s file, sealed each transaction providing evidence that one little loan snowballed into dozens more.

“It was $10,000 here and $5,000 here and it just kept going and going and going. So, every time I had a sale, she took my whole commission. I could barely keep my head above water,” Behrens said.  

Court documents that Behrens said she now knows were fake appeared to back up Kagel’s story that two attorneys kept asking for more money for court fees and fines. Without getting paid, the lawsuits would be thrown out and they would lose all the money they had already sunk into the deal.

Behrens said Kagel told her it was all filed under seal so if she talked about it to anyone, the court would throw it out and they would lose everything.

Behrens' close relative also got roped in. He was a financial lifeline for Behrens, and he ultimately started giving money directly to Kagel too.

“I met with Missy because I didn't believe all this stuff was true, and she convinced me that it was true,” he said.

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