A De Pere man has avoided a possible prison sentence by agreeing to the destruction of his two rare Japanese muscle cars, one of which appeared in the movie "The Fast and the Furious."



Authorities seized Justin Beno's two Nissan Skylines in 2010 and intend to crush them this week after giving Beno a brief chance to collect a few personal belongings from them. The two cars together cost Beno about $75,000 and have a sales value of about $100,000, he said.



Beno, 32, faced several felony counts relating to conspiracy to commit fraud and possessing vehicles without vehicle identification numbers. In a plea deal, he accepted responsibility for three misdemeanor counts in exchange for giving up his cars.



"There's no doubt I broke some laws," said Beno, who claimed it's all due to a misunderstanding. "I have no problem accepting consequences on the charges that were fair … but this was taken to a degree that is just absurd."



That's not the way Brown County Deputy District Attorney Dana Johnson sees it. To him, Beno knew exactly what he was doing, tried to circumvent the law and should count himself lucky he wasn't convicted of something worse.



"I thought the punishment was appropriate," Johnson said. "I guess he doesn't think it was fair. I thought it was very fair."