Queens DA Indicts Nine In Alleged Straw Buyer Scam Using Fake Identities To Fradulently Flip Homes; Widow Has Home Sold Out From Under Her

In Jamaica, Queens, the New York Daily News reports:

• An accused sex tour operator and a high-ranking Brooklyn court official were among nine people indicted Tuesday in a $1.4 million mortgage fraud scheme that featured stolen identities and an elaborate series of masquerades.(1) In the scheme, con artists using fake IDs to conceal their participation bought and sold two Queens properties and one in Brooklyn and then took out the mortgages, authorities said.

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• The victims included a Jamaica woman who owned her home outright and now faces foreclosure; and a New Jersey woman, whose identity was stolen and is now fighting off banks over mortgages fraudulently taken out in her name, said [Queens District Attorney Richard] Brown.

In addition to the accused sex tour operator (who is also a certified public accountant) and the now-chief deputy county clerk for Kings County (an attorney who, prior to taking his current position, was in private practice at the time of the alleged bad acts and, according to this New York Post article, the brother of a Brooklyn trial judge), a disbarred attorney who allegedly handled all the closings of the transactions involved was also among the indicted, a Queens DA press release said.

For more, see Court clerk indicted in mortgage scam.

See also:

• New York Law Journal: Court Clerk Charged in Mortgage Scheme (A solo practioner when he allegedly falsified documents, the clerk allegedly shared fees with a second, disbarred attorney),
• Queens District Attorney press release: Nine Charged In $1.4 Million Mortgage Fraud Operation That Used Stolen Identities To fraudulently Flip Properties (Widow’s Home Allegedly Sold Out From Under Her),
• New York Post: HOUSE 'ROBBERS' (JUDGE'S BROTHER WAS SWINDLER IN HOME SALES: DA).

(1) According to a Queens district attorney press release, those charged are Norman Barabash, 63, Bellerose; Shamim, a.k.a. Sam, Choudhury, 35, Jamaica, N.Y.; Gulam, a.k.a. Zack, Chowdhury, 22, Lawrence; John D’Emic, 59, Brooklyn; Daisy Guzman-Saavedra, 38, Yorktown Heights; Nazrul Islam, 23, Jamaica, N.Y.; Alan Morris, 58, New Hyde Park, N.Y.; Boris Nektalov, 23, Flushing; Rajendar Persaud, a.k.a., Rommel Persaud, 35, Verbank, N.Y.