Senior Member Of Boiler Room Telemarketing Sales Team Gets 52 Months for Role In Loan Modification Scam

From the Office of the U.S. Attorney (Bridgeport, Connecticut):

• Deirdre M. Daly, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, announced that MEHDI MOAREFIAN, also known as “Michael Miller,” 37, of Irvine, California, was sentenced [...] to 52 months of imprisonment, followed by three years of supervised release, for participating in an extensive mortgage loan modification scheme. MOAREFIAN also was ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $2,390,496.59.
  
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  [M]OAREFIAN was a senior member of the sales team. Acting as representatives of [a slew of controlled] entities, MOAREFIAN and other co-conspirators cold-called homeowners and offered to provide mortgage loan modification services to those who were having difficulty repaying their home mortgage loans.
  
  The defendants charged homeowners fees that typically ranged from approximately $2,500 to $4,300 for their services. To induce homeowners to pay these fees, the defendants falsely represented that the homeowners already had been approved for mortgage loan modifications on extremely favorable terms; the mortgage loan modifications already had been negotiated with the homeowners’ lenders; the homeowners qualified for and would receive financial assistance under various government mortgage relief programs, including the Troubled Asset Relief Program and the Home Affordable Modification Program; and if for some reason the mortgage loan modifications fell through, the homeowners would be entitled to a full refund of their fees.
  
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  Few homeowners ever received any type of mortgage loan modification through the defendants’ companies, and few homeowners received refunds of their fees.
  
  Participants in the scheme used pseudonyms and periodically changed their business and operating names to evade detection. The defendants also directed homeowners to mail their checks to addresses and mail boxes that the defendants and their co-conspirators had set up in states other than California.
  
  As a result of this scheme, more than 1,000 homeowners suffered losses totaling more than $3 million.
  
  The investigation revealed that the top tier of salesmen, including MOAREFIAN, were paid based on commission and typically earned 45 percent to 50 percent of the final fee, after $750 to $1,000 was taken [] for administrative costs.

Source: California Resident Sentenced to 52 Months in Federal Prison for Defrauding Struggling Homeowners.