Posts Tagged ‘scams’

With more cases pouring in, foreclosure scams are now leading to arrests. In California the situation is dotted with foreclosures with scammers following close on its heels. The story is the same. The victims fell for the scheme of promises to protect properties. Hundreds of victims lost not only their houses but also tidy sums of money to these scammers. Recently four arrests have been made.

It is mostly the Latino immigrants who are being foreclosed upon. They are easy targets for these scammers. It is happening in San Diego, Riverside, San Bernardino and Los Angeles Counties. They are being duped into signing off the title deed of their houses with the lure of establishing that property as a federal land grant. The victims were made to believe that if this was done then the units could not be repossessed. In reality there is no legal basis to the argument said the Attorney General of California, Jerry Brown on Thursday 22nd May 2008. He explains “there hasn’t been a legitimate use of the land grant since the conclusion of the Mexican-American War.”

On Wednesday last, the FBI from the District Attorney’s Office of San Diego County took into custody William Hutchings (62), Xiaoke Li (43), Edgar Martinez (30) and Diego Gil (38). The first two were from San Diego. The residence of the other two remains unclear. An arrest warrant has been issued for Shawna Landis (29) residing in Sorrento Valley. They are all facing similar charges of conspiracy, theft and fraudulent practices on many counts. Their assets are being frozen together with their bank accounts. The companies through which they operated are now being placed under injunction. Penalty charges will be brought against these. The accused targeted the non-English speaking Latino house owners who were under the foreclosure cloud. They came with promises of help and assistance. The victims relied on them to stop being evicted. Hutchings has been identified as the ringleader of the nefarious scheme. The group operated through a number of limited liability corporations – Federal Land Grant Company, Land Grant Services and KBS Resources. Seminars were organized by the team in which the participants were told that if they wanted to stop the taking over of their properties they would have to sign over the deeds to any one of the corporations. Then they would record a land grant on the aforesaid property. This was their mode of operation according to court reports.

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More and more house owners who were and are victims of foreclosures are coming out with foreclosure scam stories. Many companies came forward with rosy promises of helping to prevent foreclosures but ultimately nothing happens except that the victims find themselves poorer.

The story of Chantae Grandsberry of Brooklyn Center is one of many. She was hunting around for someone to help her save the house that was her home. Her searches took her to an Oklahoma firm and at that time she believed that she had knocked at the right address. The firm was freely quoting from the Bible on its website and introduced themselves as foreclosure prevention specialists who believed in Christian values. Grandsberry and her husband were taken in by these holy platitudes. At that time Chantae was expecting a child and believed that those who cited the Lord could not sin. But in a short time she lost her house last October when the company – American Foreclosure Specialists, failed to keep their promises. They had taken $1,200 in advance although this was in violation of Minnesota law, commented the Attorney General of Minnesota, Lori Swanson.

In the beginning of the month Swanson filed law suits against American Foreclosure Specialists and three other firms – all being based outside the state. They had violated the law by collecting fees even before providing services they had promised to do so. Here the matter did not end. Because of their tall talk, the house owners lost time and more funds trying to salvage the foreclosure hit wreckage. Thus these scammers made a bad situation even worse. Swanson filed the suits in the District Court of Hennepin County. She is also trying to prevent these scammers from operating in Minnesota. This is part of the general programme the Attorney General has taken up to sieve out the fraudsters and cheaters.

The cases were registered against American Foreclosure Specialists, National Foreclosure Relief of Nevada, Lewis Loss Mitigation of Alabama (also operating as Stop Foreclosure and Lewis and Associates Consulting), D.R. Financial Services of California (also working as D.R. Financial and Superior Home Loans), Mortgage Default Assistance of Florida and Home Assure of Florida.

Despite official measures being taken against the scammers, it is essential that the people become aware of the rising number of cheats and tricksters. In fact their numbers are rising with the number of foreclosures. The foreclosure notice traumatizes the victim who cannot think clearly.

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