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So I currently have my mother in laws car in my driveway. She took it to her mechanic because the ac was only blowing cold out of the right side. Looking through here, I realize that is most likely due to a low charge, but he decided that it was a clogged vent and proceeded to rip apart the dash. Since she got it back, the drls, fog lights, reverse lights, and radio don't work, and the dash cluster lights are out. The cluster was flaky before this happened, so I pulled it out and replaced the stepper motors which fixed all the gauges, but the backlighting was still out. I tested all the bulbs and didn't see any issues with them. After this, I rechecked fuses and relays, put a wire back up under the dash, and now the cluster doesn't seem to be getting power at all. I'm assuming he messed up wiring somewhere in the dash since all the wires are just shoved back in the dash rather than put back in their proper place, but I can't see anything out of place. He also mangled all the vinyl on the dash and broke clips taking it apart, so it doesn't look like he was very careful. Before he touched it the only thing broken was the ac and random stepper motors, everything else was fine. I don't even know where to start looking at this point, so any tips would be extremely helpful.

I'd tell you to take it back for him to fix, but it sounds like it would probably get even worse.

If it were me, I would personally take the dash out again and check everything over with a fine-tooth comb. Removing the dash isn't hard if you know were all the fasteners are.

Sorry to hear to had to deal with such a crappy mechanic. How can mechanics give people their car back with a straight face after doing this kind of work?

Take and post pictures too if needed, many of us have had dashes and more out and are pretty familiar with the setup.

Awesome. I have it apart so I can get to all the wiring underneath, so I will take pics when I get home if it's not raining.

Just was up under the dash and checked all the connections under there and pulled everything in the center to check behind there. Can't find anything loose or disconnected. Found the elc fuse blown, replaced it, but that wouldn't effect the other issues anyway. I'm at a loss. So you know the wiring to the cluster so I can check of its getting power? I also don't think the security system is working.

Try reseating the cluster, and check to see if he remembered to plug all the connectors back into the DIM

I've had the cluster in and out, I have checked all the DIM connections. The one DIM connection had some sort of liquid residue in it which was odd, I cleaned it off the best I could. Maybe they are plugged into the wrong spots?

Here's something new though. While checking the ground buses I noticed the one behind the driver seat sparked when putting it back. Then the front driver side bus, once I removed it, the cluster, that shows no signs of life, starts doing some odd things. The flashers blink, the speedometer and battery gauges start twitching, and the systems monitor starts blinking. Why would disconnecting a ground bus cause things to have power?