South Carolina Criminal Lawyer Blog

The Charleston Post and Courier has reported that an Iva man has been charged with committing lewd acts in Anderson, South Carolina. The allegations are based on the defendant's alleged activities with the Boys and Girls Club in Anderson. The details of the case have not been released and no South Carolina defense attorney has been listed as representing Mikel Sylvester Boseman. Boseman will most likely be indicted in the coming days and will need to hire a criminal defense attorney.
In South Carolina, the prosecution of sexual crimes is mainly handled by the local solicitor's office. Child pornography indictments are usually handled by the United States Attorney.
The Myrtle Beach Sun News is reporting today that the trial of man charged with kidnapping and sexually assaulting a girl will postponed because of witness problems. There was a several comments posted on the Sun News related to this article. Each one was a basic conviction of the defendant without knowing any details related to the case. This is the new phenomenon in America, "Guilty until proven innocent." No matter what the evidence, as soon as the public hears someone has been arrested then they are judged guilty by the press. There is never a report that the evidence is less than credible or that there are mistakes made by police. It appears that every time a person is freed because of DNA evidence there is very little press. No follow up stories on the innocent man trying to get reintroduced to society. Any criminal defense attorney must be ready to ensure that the press is aware of the fact that each and every person accused of a crime in this country is innocent until proven guilty. Our forefathers fought for the right to not be convicted before evidence had been present. Our office of Myrtle Beach Criminal Defense attorneys is ready to represent our clients all the way from indictment through an appeal.

Continue reading "Man Arrested for Lewd Acts on Children" »

Posted by Russell Mace | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Mortgage Fraud

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Another realtor has plead guilty to mortgage fraud. The case is out of North Carolina and is just the beginning of what many government officials are calling a nationwide investigation into real estate investments. Gregory Rankin plead guilty to a mortgage fraud scheme that is said to have been related to over $15 million in loans and 270 properties in Mecklenburg County. Charlotte is the largest city in North Carolina and as such will be the most investigated city for mortgage fraud in the Carolinas. Rankin was realtor agent for the Charlotte company Realty Solutions. There are 5 other defendants on the indictment as co-conspirators to counts of mail, bank and wire fraud. Based on the amount of money and the amount of properties involved, each defendant, including Rankin is facing prison time under the Federal Sentencing Guidelines.

Rankin is charged with being involved in 4 mortgage fraud schemes that defrauded the lenders. In this case the government has alleged a builder kickback scheme. This is when the builder gives back a portion of the purchase price to the buyer or the real estate agent or real estate broker.

Rankin has agreed to cooperate with the government. This will mean he is the so called "flip" for this case. He will now prepare to be debriefed by the government. He will give up all his co-defendants and anyone else in order to reduce his prison time exposure. The government will request the judge to reduce Rankin's prison term based upon his cooperation. If Rankin can give enough information and testify for the government, he may well get out of serving any prison time.

Continue reading "North Carolina Mortgage Fraud Conviction" »

Posted by Russell Mace | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Mortgage Fraud

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Recently an article on mortgage fraud in South Carolina was published on the Morning News Reporter column in South Carolina Now. The article described the reasons for the decrease in mortgage fraud indictments. These reasons do not make much sense to me. I have continually defended clients for mortgage fraud and the recent addition of a mortgage fraud hotline in South Carolina should increase the incidents of these cases, not decrease. The South Carolina Department of Consumer Affairs credit the mortgage fraud hotline as a measure that has reduced the mortgage fraud rate. This hotline was just instituted in the past few months. Most of the lending and real estate transactions occurred prior to the recession and prior to this hotline.

As I have mentioned previously, mortgage fraud is going to increase dramatically this year and next year as the Justice Department has recently asked the FBI to assign over 100 agents to investigate these allegations. You can bet that there will be some innocent people indicted for mortgage fraud with the pressure being applied by the government to explain the vast number of foreclosures. There have been more than 400 real estate related indictments since March of this year. The FBI has code named the investigation "Operation Malicious Mortgage" and resulted in 60 arrests today. The FBI has stated that the target state will be Florida, Georgia, Texas, California, and Michigan. These are also the states with some of the highest foreclosure rates.

Targets of Mortgage Fraud Indictments:
Mortgage Brokers
Real Estate Agents
Lenders
Straw Buyers
Appraisers
Attorneys

The real estate boom caused many people with no experience in real estate speculation to get in over their heads and lose everything. Even if no illegal activity occurred in the real estate transaction, a complaint and improper information can get you indicted. If you are even remotely concerned about an indictment you need to speak with a criminal defense lawyer that is experienced in defending mortgage fraud indictments. Practicing in Miami for many years and defending multi-count indictments for fraud totaling almost 1 billion in loss provides the experience needed to defend your case.

Continue reading "Mortgage Fraud Indictments Drop in South Carolina" »

Posted by Russell Mace | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Mortgage Fraud

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A Kalamazoo man (Rodney Hixon) is under investigation for mortgage fraud. He apparently purchased 38 homes in a 22 month period. Local investigators are claiming that he may have committed mortgage fraud. Lenders are claiming that they have been left with 3.5 million in debts for the loans. If that is correct, under the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, Mr. Hixon is facing 57-71 months in prison on the mortgage fraud charge in Federal Court. The question that I have is why would anyone lend this gentleman all this money in such a short period of time. There is some serious injustice with this concept. Companies lend all this money hoping to make a wind fall on the loans and then when loans are not paid they call the FBI and cry fraud. These lending companies had an obligation to check the borrowers information and confirm all documentation that was provided. The exception to this is when the lending company is the victim of an elaborate mortgage fraud scheme. A good criminal defense lawyer will investigate the information and be able to determine if the mortgage fraud scheme was perpetrated on the lender or was lack of carrying on behalf of the lender.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) keeps records related to mortgage fraud and the following information is amount of fraud they say has increased since 2002.

2002- 5,623 Cases, with $293 million in losses.
2003- 6,936 Cases, with $225 million in losses.
2004- 17,127 Cases, with $429 million in losses.
2005- 21,994 Cases, with $1.0. billion in losses.
2006- 35,617 Cases, with $946 million in losses.

There are no statistics for 2007 as yet. The amount is surely going to be highest ever. There is also going to be a sharp increase in investigations. The FBI has assigned over 100 agents to mortgage fraud in the past several months.

The inner workings of a mortgage fraud scheme. In South Carolina, Florida and some areas of Georgia, the value of real estate doubeled, tripled and even quadrupled in some markets. Some of this rise in value was legitimate and others were mortgage fraud. The government alleges that many fraud schemes begin with a property owner obtaining a fraudulent appraisal which establishes an over inflated value for the property. The property owner then sells the property to a so called straw buyer (no legitimate). The fake buyer gets a loan from a lender for the over inflated price. The buyer gives the proceeds of the loan to the seller who in turn gives the buyer back money from the sale. At times the appraiser and a mortgage broker also get a cut back. This mortgage fraud scheme is truly against federal law and violates several other federal statutes. However, there is also a real risk that an innocent seller caught in a hot market will be indicted for completely legal conduct. The government only needs the buyer to point the finger at the seller and we now have a conspiracy to defraud a lender. As I have stated before, in our system you are guilty until proven innocent. The government will move forward on a federal indictment based on the statements of only one person. If you are accused of mortgage fraud you need to contact our office immediately. You must prepare to defend yourself and protect your assests from forfeiture proceedings. The Government may seek to forfeit any assests (especially real estate) on a mortgage fraud indictment. Appraiser fraud is not as common of an indicted crime. The apprasier is usually used as a witness against the mortgage broker and seller of the property. Mortgage broker fraud is a common indictment and is always accompanied by other counts for wire fraud, mail fraud and money laundering.

Posted by Russell Mace | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Mortgage Fraud

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There has been a tremendous amount of mortgage fraud indictments in the past year all across the country. Just as when corporate America was being investigated for accounting practices several years ago, now the investigation is related to real estate investments and the practices that are alleged to have caused the collapse in the real estate market. Federal mortgage fraud indictments are going to become a very common event over the next two years. Mortgage brokers, realtors, lenders, and borrowers will come under the eye of the federal government. Defense lawyers must be aware of the elements and the defenses available to a mortgage fraud indictment.

Deliberate Ignorance- this is the answer to the classic defense "I did not know this was illegal". Many times in a federal indictment for mortgage fraud, a defendant will say they were unaware that any of the events that were occurring were fraudulent. That is to say, I did not see anything wrong with the transaction. Many federal jurisdictions have a jury instruction that explains away any lack of knowledge. Your defense attorney must be ready to combat this jury instruction with facts that would lead any reasonable person to believe they were not acting with any illegal motive and or had no notice that an illegal activity was occurring. The exposure under a mortgage fraud indictment will be based on the amount of money that was alleged to have loaned based on the fraud.

South Carolina defense attorneys must be aware that South Carolina indictments will be increasing over the coming years. There is a tremendous amount of complaints coming into the FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) about mortgage fraud in South Carolina.

Continue reading "Mortgage Fraud" »

Posted by Russell Mace | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Mortgage Fraud

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