Michigan Sentences four in with Mortgage Fraud

Terrence Berg, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan along with Andrew G. Arena, Special Agent in charge of the Detroit field office for the Federal Bureau of Investigation announced on September 3rd the sentences of four mortgage fraudsters.

Myron L. Hooker, 43, of Detroit has been convicted as the ring leader in the conspiracy. The press release states that Hooker conspired with three others to defraud mortgage lenders in a straw buyer scheme. Hooker coordinated and directed the actions of the loan officers under his employ. He recruited straw buyers, sellers, property appraisers and title agents to join him in his conspiracy to defraud. He retained an appraiser to falsify appraisal values of the properties involved. He paid straw buyers to perform as borrowers for those properties and he completed the applications for mortgage to show reflect the straw buyers were creditworthy. The misrepresented applications were then submitted to mortgage lenders for approval. The loans were approved by the lending institutions and the proceeds were divided among the conspirators. The mortgage loan then went into default and the mortgage lenders were left with a loss over one million dollars.

Hooker was sentenced to serve five years and two months in federal prison for wire fraud and three years and three months for conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud. His sentence is to be served concurrently. In addition, Hooker was ordered to pay restitution of more than one million dollars and pay a fine of one hundred dollars per conviction. Hooker when released from federal prison must also serve two to three years on supervised release.

The three other defendants Peter Garland, 40, formerly of Southfield, Nicole Jackson, 38 , formerly of Detroit and Antwan Mcrea, 35 of Detroit were also sentenced in the case to wire and mail fraud.

Garland was sentenced to two years and two months in federal prison; ordered to pay restitution; ordered to pay fine per conviction and serve supervised release.

Mcrea was sentenced to two years in federal prison; ordered to pay restitution; ordered to pay fine per conviction and serve supervised release.

Jackson was sentenced to one day in federal prison; five months of home confinement; ordered to pay restitution; ordered to pay fine per conviction and three years of supervised release.

Berg stated that the United States Attorney General Office is catching up on these fraudsters and they are starting to see the price for their criminal activities. He affirmed that mortgage fraud has created an extreme threat to our economy. The sentencing of these four individuals today represents the Attorney General’s Office and the Federal Bureau of Investigation commitment to hold these individuals accountable for their crimes. Berg thanked the Federal Bureau of Investigation for their continued efforts in bring mortgage and bank fraudsters to justice.