Real Estate Operator Gets Five Years For Role In Short Sale Flipping Scam That Targeted Financially Distressed, Underwater Homeowners, Screwing Unwitting Banksters In The Process

From the Office of the U.S. Attorney (Alexandria, Virginia):

• Charise Stone, 46, of Ashburn, Virginia, was sentenced [] to 60 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release for her role in a real estate short sale scheme that included tax and mortgage fraud, and passing fraudulent financial documents. Stone was also ordered to forfeit $721,552, and ordered to pay restitution of $2,441,174 to the victim financial institutions and the IRS.
  
  Stone was found guilty by a federal jury on May 27, 2015. According to court documents, from 2007 to 2010 Stone targeted distressed homeowners who owed more on their mortgage loan than the market value of the home with false promises of financial recovery.
  Stone acquired distressed homeowners’ properties in her own name or under entities she controlled, made false representations to mortgage lenders in order to induce approval of the short sales, and then re-sold the properties – often the same day or the next – to new buyers at a price above the short sale amount, in violation of agreements made with mortgage lenders.
  
  Jose Marinay owned a settlement company that closed every short sale transaction for Stone. Marinay pleaded guilty to wire-fraud conspiracy on May 27, 2014. At his and Stone’s direction, fraudulent HUD-1 settlement statements were prepared to facilitate the transactions, and Stone destroyed some of the incriminating documents after closings. Financial institutions suffered losses of at least $2.2 million from the scheme, while Stone profited more than $720,000 from these transactions but failed to file individual income tax returns. She also sent fictitious bonds to the IRS in an attempt to pay off her tax liability, and she sent fake international promissory notes to creditors purporting to satisfy her credit card debt as well as her mortgage loan.

Source: Ashburn Woman Sentenced to 5 Years for Mortgage and Tax Fraud.