How To Prosecute Mortgage Fraud
| Unlawful methods or actions that are used with the intention of obtaining a mortgage loan are collectively termed as mortgage fraud. In case of a mortgage fraud, individuals try to misrepresent information on a loan application so as to defraud a financial institution. |
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According to an estimate made by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) approximately $4.2 billion have been lost as a result of fraud mortgage practices in the year 2006. The part of it all is that these figures have been increasing by almost 60 percent every year for the last several years.
Mortgage fraud has indeed become a matter of financial concern. All allegations or cases related to mortgage fraud are investigated by the Financial Institution Fraud Unit, an independent investigation cell under the FBI. Some important activities compiled by the FBI indicating the occurrence of mortgage fraud include property flipping, nominee loans, falsified income details, improper employment certificates, inflated appraisals, misrepresented assets, misrepresented liabilities, foreclosure schemes and equity skimming.
There is no special statute under the current federal law used for prosecuting mortgage fraud. However, the existing mail fraud, bank fraud and wire fraud statutes can be applied by federal authorities to investigate and prosecute mortgage fraud as these laws have been defined in a broad perspective. Apart from these, there are several other federal statutes that are also applicable to mortgage fraud. Some times, even an alleged conspiracy to commit a mortgage fraud is punishable under these statutes. Punishment includes fines or imprisonment up to 20 years. In case a person commits fraud against a federally-insured financial institution, punishment can be a fine up to $1 million and imprisonment up to 30 years.
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How To Prosecute Mortgage Fraud