Accused Foreclosure Rescue Operator Under Indictment & Free On Bond Continues To Target Financially Strapped Homeowners

In Brooklyn, New York, the New York Daily News reports:

• Brooklyn homeowner Angela Neysmith scraped up $1,500 when real estate broker Lavette Bills promised to trim her loan payments via President Obama's foreclosure prevention plan. "She said she could put me into the Obama program," Neysmith said, recalling Bills told her, "I could get a fixed rate and everything would be good for me."
  Everything was not so good. Neysmith, 50, did not get the promised loan modification to bail her out of the foreclosure she was facing on her Midwood St. home, but Bills managed to jack up her fee to $3,000. Neysmith says she was forced to send papers to the bank to process her modification application because Bills failed to do so.

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• What Neysmith didn't know was that a month before Bills began dealing with her, she and three others were indicted in a $3 million mortgage fraud scheme. Bills pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial, free on $250,000 bond.

• Authorities say Bills' victims were distressed homeowners who called a radio show Bills hosted on WBLS and WLIB in 2007 in which she held herself out as a "foreclosure specialist." In a brief interview last Thursday, Bills denied scamming Neysmith, but declined to answer questions.

• A few hours later, Bills showed up at Neysmith's house with a check for $1,500. Neysmith says Bills promised she'd get the rest of her money next month. "She says she wants no publicity," Neysmith said.(1)

For the story, see Homeowner victimized by broker promising to trim loan using Obama's foreclosure prevention plan.

(1) Bills' desire to keep this matter quiet is understandable inasmuch as a simple phone call to the U.S. Attorney's Office could be enough to set in motion the process of revoking her $250K bond and lead to her waiting for her criminal trial sitting in jail.