Sales Rep Who Peddled Bogus Loan Modifications Cops Guilty Plea for Role In Ripoff That Screwed 500+ Struggling Homeowners Throughout U.S. Out Of At Least $2.3 Million

From the Office of the U.S. Attorney (New York City):

• Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that JONATHAN LYONS, a former sales representative at a company purporting to provide mortgage modification services, pled guilty [] in Manhattan federal court for his role in a multimillion-dollar scheme that victimized more than 500 financially struggling homeowners across the country.
  
  
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  According to the allegations contained in the Indictment and related Informations, the plea agreements, and statements made in court proceedings:
  
  From approximately January 2009 to June 2011, LYONS and his co-conspirators perpetrated a scheme to defraud homeowners who were in danger of losing their homes because they could not afford to pay their residential mortgages. Through a company located in Long Island, New York (“Company-1”), and its successor companies (the “Mortgage Modification Companies”), LYONS, his co-conspirators, and other employees falsely promised to help financially struggling residential mortgage holders refinance their mortgages for lower interest rates and monthly payments.
  
  Despite the defendants’ claims, however, the Mortgage Modification Companies delivered little or no service to their customers, diverting most, if not all, of the customers’ payments to the Mortgage Modification Companies’ owners and employees rather than using those funds to assist customers in procuring mortgage modifications. Through their scheme, the Mortgage Modification Companies obtained at least $2.3 million from more than 500 homeowners throughout the United States.

Source: Sales Representative Pleads Guilty In Connection With Multi-Million Dollar Mortgage Modification Scheme.