The co-conspirators are accused of using the victims’ identities to secure multi-million dollar hard money loans using residential real estate as collateral.
Eleven defendants were arrested on charges including wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, and money laundering conspiracy. They are accused of stealing the identities of elderly victims, using that information to obtain title reports for residential properties, and using those property titles as collateral for multimillion-dollar hard money loans.
The group operated from January 2021 to May 2023 and allegedly fraudulently obtained personal information from elderly California property owners in Santa Monica, Hollywood, the Hollywood Hills, Westwood, and Chinatown, according to a grand jury indictment. They then allegedly created fake IDs and email accounts in the victim’s name, posing as “agents, brokers, representatives, or relatives of the victim,” and submitted “fraudulent applications to private lenders for hard money loans secured by the victim’s property.”
The false documents, which included “bank statements, rental agreements, doctor’s notes, and death certificates,” were allegedly used to support the co-conspirators’ stories about the victims’ assets, finances, health, and the purpose of the loans. The documents were also allegedly used to create a “synthetic identity document,” which was then used to open a bank account in the victim’s name.
According to a statement from the Department of Justice regarding the case, the total intended loss was approximately $17.4 million, and the actual loss was approximately $6 million.
“These defendants not only stole personal information, they used that stolen personal information to secure large real estate loans, fabricate financial documents, and move millions of dollars through a maze of fraudulent businesses and funnel accounts,” Tyler Hatcher, special agent in charge of the IRS-CI Los Angeles Field Office, said in a statement.
“Our investigators tracked every transfer, every transfer, and every fake account to expose the financial backbone of this conspiracy. This indictment sends a clear message: IRS-CI will dismantle the financial pipelines that enable complex fraud schemes to flourish, and we will hold accountable those who exploit our financial system to profit.”
If convicted, the defendants face up to 20 years in federal prison for each count of fraud and money laundering, plus two consecutive years of mandatory prison terms for each count of aggravated identity theft.
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