San Diego Feds Get Plea In $30 Million Real Estate, Straw Buyer Scam

The San Diego Union-Tribune reports:

• "Rollo “Rick” Norton, the local financial planner at the center of a $30 million scheme that decimated the life's savings of dozens of his former clients, pleaded guilty [Wednesday] in federal court to one count of mail fraud. Norton's plea ... came in the midst of a nearly two-year FBI investigation into allegations that ... he stole millions from clients through sham real estate transactions at ... a Pacific Beach condominium complex. Also pleading guilty to mail fraud ... was Scott Greer, 31, of Ramona, a former employee of Norton's. The mail fraud counts were in connection with using the U.S. Postal Service to perpetuate the scheme. [...] At least nine lawsuits have been filed against Norton over the past two years by former clients and investors, many of whom were elderly. In recent depositions in some of those suits, Norton has admitted to a complex fraud scheme and implicated several employees of Chicago Title, one of the nation's largest title insurance companies."

Reportedly, part of the overall scheme involved Norton using his investors as straw purchasers of condos to obtain new loans without their knowledge in an apartment complex that he made into a condo-conversion project. For more, see Financial planner in scam gives guilty plea (Clients lost $30 million in condominium scheme).

For earlier articles on this case, see:

• Millions Are Missing (NFL players among 49 clients who say Ramona adviser bamboozled them),
• Fraud? Or Just Risk? (Clients of Ramona financial planner contend he bilked them of $35 million).