Missouri Man Pleads Guilty to Mortgage Fraud

Charles M. Davis, 34, of Rogersville, Missouri, pleaded guilty on August 11th for this participation in a $1.2 million dollar mortgage fraud scam. Davis according to the U.S Attorneys office was a Mortgage Broker who owned Master Marketing Consultants in the Springfield area.

Davis for his part in the scam knowingly participated in not one but two conspiracy to contract for mortgage loans with mortgage lenders with regard to purchase transactions. The charges against Davis stem from an indictment filed back in November of 2008. The indictment charged Davis with falsifying mortgage applications with false income data, omission of the borrowers’ liabilities, representing the borrower as an owner occupying resident and falsely claiming the borrowers’ place of employment and offering those applications to mortgage lenders for the purpose of obtaining funds by fraudulent means.

The funds from the purchases of the properties were given to the borrowers of the properties without the mortgage lenders knowledge and were conducted outside of the mortgage lenders closing of the property that was purchased. The funds were routed through Master Marketing Consultants and Metro Consulting Group and facilitated by Davis.

Davis was assisted by Scott Allen Kassebaum, 42, and his wife Cheryl Joan Kassebaum, 43, of Ozark. The Kassebaums plead guilty to the mortgage conspiracy for the roles they played as co-owners of Metro Consulting Group.

The total of fraudulent mortgage loans involved twenty properties that had values of two hundred thousand to five hundred thousand dollars. The funds returned to the borrowers were on an average of thirty thousand dollars to one hundred thousand dollars.  Several of the properties have been or are in the process of foreclosure.

Davis was convicted and pleaded guilty to two counts of wire fraud in relation to the funds he knowingly transferred through Master marketing Consultants and Metro Consulting Group. In addition to the two counts of wire fraud he was convicted of money laundering, as a result of the monetary transactions with regard to criminally-derived property. The sentence he faces for his involvement is ninety years in federal prison without the opportunity of parole, a fine up to three million and an order for restitution. His sentencing is scheduled to be determined after the United States Probation Office completes their presentencing investigation.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Internal Revenue Service’s criminal investigators are responsible for the discovery and capture of Davis and his co-conspirators.