Originaly by Freeman Klopott: Federal authorities have accused a Virginia accountant of writing false letters verifying the incomes of homebuyers who were caught in a mortgage fraud scheme that caused banks to lose about $3 million when their homes went into foreclosure. Maria E. Conrad would receive...

Originaly By Mary Kane: For neighborhoods fighting the blight and deteriorating property values caused by foreclosed properties that banks abandon or unload on speculators, this is big news: A housing court judge in Cleveland has ordered Wells Fargo to clean up the foreclosed houses it owns in Cleveland. In...

Originaly by HA: More people linked to Accel Mortgage face federal charges Another mortgage fraud criminal case has been filed in federal court, this one accusing more people affiliated with Accel Mortgage LLC with conspiracy to commit mail, wire and loan fraud. Charged in the case are Carla Dutro, identified...

Economists, politicians, and pundits refer to “toxic assets” as if they are some unspeakable stew bubbling in a barrel behind an old warehouse. But “toxic assets” are actually mortgages and, by extension, houses and the people who live in them. Sandra Berrios is one of millions...

Criminal fraud may be the most underreported aspect of our current financial crisis. In this “Road to Ruin” report, former subprime lenders from Ameriquest, once the country’s largest lender, describe a system rife with fraud. They describe how a “by-any-means-necessary”...

Federal Trade Commission Release: At the request of the Federal Trade Commission, a federal court has halted a bogus mortgage foreclosure prevention operation that misrepresented both the “loss mitigation” services it offered and the earnings potential of the business opportunity it sold. The FTC...

Originaly By Naomi Smoot: CHARLES TOWN - Mountain Justice Inc., a Charleston-based agency, has opened a new office in Clarksburg in an attempt to better serve clients in the state’s eastern and northern counties. The nonprofit group opened its first office in 1996, to help provide legal assistance...

Originaly by DEVLIN BARRETT: WASHINGTON – Brash Texas billionaire R. Allen Stanford was indicted and jailed Friday on charges his international banking empire was really just a Ponzi scheme built on lies, bluster and bribery. The Justice Department announced charges against Stanford and six others...

by FBI NY | United States Attorney’s Office Southern District of New York | Department of Justice Press Release Eight Sentenced in Multimillion-Dollar Mortgage Fraud and Foreclosure Rescue Schemes LEV L. DASSIN, the Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced...