California Real Estate Fraud Report

Russian composer Vladimir Shainskiy, who was honored with the USSR State Prize in 1981, is enbroiled in a swindle by an Armenian woman and her husband, who managed to take control of his finances and leave him liable for $1.2 million in mortgage debt in 2007. Shainskiy, 82, alleges he was taken advantage of because of his age and his limited English skills.

Shainskiy and his wife have settled their lawsuit against severl real estate and mortgage professionals and their affiliates, claiming fraud, elder abuse, and “unconscionable” lending and real estate practices.

Read the Full Article in The Voice of San Diego by Kelly Bennett.

Three unlicensed individuals holding themselves out as licensed real estate professionals have been charged with criminal conspiracy for perpetrating an alleged “foreclosure rescue” scam, whose victims were Salinas Valley homeowners.

Maria de Lourdes Ponce and Fabian Olivarez Casillas, and Melissa Garcia, have all been charged with criminal conspiracy. Ponce is also facing charges of residential burglary, elder abuse and grand theft. If it can be proven that they unlawfully took more than $150,000 from their victims, they could also face sentencing enhancements (additional incarceration time).

The local complaint alleges that the three suspects represented themselves as real estate loan professionals affiliated with a local lender, when in fact they were unlicensed and not affiliated with that lender. They targeted Spanish-speaking homeowners facing foreclosure and for an advance fee of $2,800, promised to help negotiate refinances of the borrowers’ homes or to lower their monthly mortgage payments.

County, though they were not licensed professionals nor affiliated with the company. The trio allegedly promised their victims, mostly Spanish-speakers in danger of losing their homes to foreclosure, that they could help negotiate lower monthly mortgage payments or refinance mortgage terms with lenders.

California Civil Code 2945.4 forbids so-called “foreclosure consultants” from taking money until their work is completed. Violations can result in 3 years incarceration for convicted offenders.

Read the Full Article in The San Jose Mercury News.

Three state agencies are investigating a Grass Valley mortgage company for complaints of real estate fraud and other crimes.

Loan Sense, owned by attorney Thomas Hastert, is under investigation from the California State Department of Justice, the California State Bar and the California Department of Real Estate. Many of Hastert’s victims are thought to be the elderly.

Read the Full Article in The Union by Laura Brown.

District Attorney investigators in Modesto are looking into more complaints against Century 21 Apollo owner Jim Lankford, who was recently charged with defrauding the heir of a dead woman. Now he is being accused of swindling a large part of another widow’s family fortune.

Just two weeks ago, Lankford, obstetrician Dennise Davis and Lankford’s Century 21 broker and co-owner Stelios Papadopoulos were charged with forgery, filing a fraudulent document with the county recorder, providing false information to a lender to obtain a mortgage loan and two counts of grand theft. Additionally, Papadopoulos faces a sixth count of deed-of-trust fraud.

Read the Full Article in the Modesto Bee.

Wells Fargo Bank N.A. was order to pay Kimberly Thomas, a Silver Spring woman who defaulted on a subprime loan doctored by one of its loan offices, has been awarded $1.25 million in damages. The jury made the award based on a complaint of fraud, negligence and for inflating Thomas’ assets without her knowledge.

Read the Full Article in the Washington Business Journal.

The FBI arrested a Stockton man on suspicion of mortgage fraud in a case involving more than 100 houses he bought and sold in the past 10 years with the assistance of loan officers and escrow officers with whom he conspired.

Investigators say Ifthikhar Ahmad, 36, worked with Deborah Timmins, 49, formerly of Chicago Title and later with Commonwealth Land Title; Timmins’ twin sister, Denise James; William Bridge, 40, a mortgage broker doing business as The Loan Center in San Francisco; and John Ngo,  a senior loan coordinator with Long Beach Mortgage who approved many of Ahmad’s loans, according to the FBI report. Long Beach Mortgage was a subprime lending arm of Washington Mutual and has been the news for loan fraud by its loan officers.

Read the Full Article.

A San Jose-based company that specialized in assisting real estate investors defer paying capital gains taxes by utilizing 1031 exchanges is under investigation and its officers under a cloud of scrutiny by the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office.

The offices of Vesta Strategies and the homes of Chicago businessmen John Terzakis and Robert Estupinian were searched and both are no accusing each other of embezzling $4.5 million from the company and its clients, who are unlikely to recover any of their money.

Read the Full Article in the San Jose Mercury News.

Countrywide Home Loans has new troubles, as a senior financial analyst was arrested by the FBI and charged with downloading and selling customer data to an unauthorized party.

Rene L. Rebollo Jr., 36, a Pasadena resident, was arrested at his home and Wahid Siddiqi, 25, of Thousand Oaks was also arrested by both the FBI and the Simi Valley Police Department for having purchased the stolen customer files.

In a page from the book “How to Steal from Your Employer and Assure Getting Caught”, although Rebollos worked Monday through Friday, he would go to Countrywide offices and access the databases for about an hour on Sundays.

Read the Full Article in the Ventura County Star by Jenni Mintz.

In its administrative hearing against Bakersfield Realtors David Crisp and Carl Cole, the common thread in Cole’s testimony was his admission of ethical and possible illegal activities in the office in which he was the designated broker, followed by denials of responsibility for both his and his employees’ actions. 

Cole explained that he was busy on other company business and as such had no time to supervise his employees. This would include himself, as he signed a loan document promising he would live in a home he had just purchased in order to obtain a more favorable interest rate.

For more on the hearing - and finger-pointing, read the Full Article in Bakersfield Now.
 

The owner of Modesto-based Century 21 Apollo, who founded his company more than 26 years ago, and a obstetrician have been arrested on suspicion of mortgage fraud.

The Stanislaus County district attorney’s office arrested James Lee Lankford, 69, Stelios Papdopoulos, 74, a Century 21 broker in Lankford’s office, and Dr. Dennise Ann Davis, 55, an obstetrician with Sutter Gould Medical Foundation in Modesto were all arrested.

According to an affidavit filed with the Stanislaus County clerk by the district attorney’s office, the real estate agents helped Davis obtain a second mortgage on the home she was purchasing, which was used as a down-payment without the knowledge of the first lender. All three defendants filed fraudulent paperwork eliminating the second loan after the lender, a private party, died. The fraud was discovered by the nephew of the second lender when going through paperwork following her death.

Read the Full Article in The Modesto Bee.