Illinois Man Gets 115 Months For Pocketing $2M+ From 17 Victims In Home Equity Ripoffs

In Chicago, Illinois, the Daily Herald reports:

• A Lake Barrington man was sentenced to almost 10 years in prison in a fraud case that cost his 17 victims more than $2 million. Charles Landwer Jr., 47, formerly of Bartlett, pleaded guilty in January to mail fraud after originally being charged two years ago. Assistant U.S. Attorney Michelle Nasser said Landwer preyed on the elderly and those fearing foreclosure on their homes through his Accurate Financial Group firm, with operations in Long Grove and Bloomingdale.

• In one scheme, Landwer led a pair of Yorkville homeowners to believe that he was helping them avoid foreclosure, telling them the home needed to be put in trust while he worked out financing with the mortgage holder. He controlled the trust and transferred the home to his name, then refinanced it and tried to take out $230,000 in equity before bank investigators became suspicious and Landwer was arrested, authorities said.

• Landwer was sentenced to nine years and seven months in prison on the fraud charge and also ordered to pay $2.3 million in restitution to his victims, but according to Nasser the money was spent and the government has been unable to recover it. Landwer previously served seven years in prison in the 1990s on a conviction for soliciting a murder-for-hire after plotting to kill an employee who had agreed to be a witness in a case about an auto chop shop Landwer was running.

Source: Northwest suburban man gets nearly 10 years for fraud.

For earlier stories, see:

• Lake Barrington man led massive swindle, feds say,
• Illinois Man Charged With Theft Of Proceeds Of Elderly Woman's Home.