Cuyahoga County Mortgage Fraud Task Force Lands 8 Guilty Pleas

Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Topics: Economy, Other
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An investigation by the Cuyahoga County Mortgage Fraud-Predatory Lending Task Force has landed eight guilty pleas. The eight are among 10 defendants involved in a $560 thousand dollar mortgage fraud case in the city of Cleveland. ideastream's Mhari Saito reports.

Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Housing Court Judge Raymond Pianka started to wonder when he first heard a code violation case involving Daryle Rutherford. The property manager who later became the center of the task force’s investigation. Hundreds of thousands of dollars had been loaned for properties in terrible condition.  Pianka forwarded the case on the the FBI. The feds and the county Mortgage Fraud Task Force spent about two years on the case.

Yesterday Rutherford pleaded guilty to helping find so-called straw buyers for seven homes in Cleveland. Buyers included an unemployed South Euclid mother who bought five homes in one day. All together six individuals and two companies pleaded guilty yesterday to borrowing $560 thousand dollars from Argent Mortgage Company by lying about their income and the source of the down payments for the properties.

Defendants in the case will be sentenced later this month. One buyer in the case and iNet Mortgage Company of Fairlawn face trial on May 19. Mhari Saito, 90.3.

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This feature is part of the series Mortgage Meltdown.