The actor who starred in the hip Volkswagen “Da Da Da” commercial is really dumb, dumb, dumb.Antwon Tanner, who currently plays the character Skills on “One Tree Hill,” surrendered Thursday in Brooklyn Federal Court to face shocking charges of allegedly selling bogus Social Security numbers and cards after he was caught in a sting operation.
Tanner, 34, has no prior criminal record. He faces up to five years in prison if convicted.
“It’s really sad,” said a source familiar with the investigation. “He’s got a real career.”
Tanner pleaded not guilty at the arraignment and was released on a $250,000 bond. He and his defense lawyer refused to answer reporters’ questions.
The two-count indictment alleges Tanner and others engaged in the fraudulent scheme between December 2005 and July 2008.
Tanner, who lives in California, supplied 16 Social Security numbers and three bogus Social Security cards to a middleman who sold them to an undercover Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent, the source said.
Some of the Social Security numbers were unassigned while others were traced to dead people and to persons who did not know their identification numbers had been stolen by Tanner, the source said.
At the same time Tanner was pocketing thousands of illicit dollars, the diminutive actor’s career was taking off.
He appeared in the film “Coach Carter” with Samuel L. Jackson in 2005 and the acclaimed Volkswagen commercial in which he plays the passenger in the auto bopping his head to the catchy soundtrack “Da Da Da.”
Tanner participated in the scheme from the West Coast and did not meet personally to hand over the fake numbers, the source said. Some of the bogus documents were sent in the mail.
A spokesman for the CW Network, which airs “One Tree Hill,” declined to comment on Tanner’s arrest.
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