A College Park loan broker was sentenced to five years and five months in prison for his role in a mortgage fraud scheme prosecutors said defrauded a Beltsville lending company out of more than $600,000.
Federal prosecutors said 29-year-old Dema Daiga recruited fake purchasers to apply for mortgages on Baltimore properties and helped those people submit false employment histories, earnings and assets in applying for mortgage loans in 2008.
Five of the six properties purchased in the scheme went into default, which caused the Beltsville lending business Landmark Funding LLC to lose $664,493, lay off at least 20 employees and ultimately close.
Daiga’s partner in the scheme, 30-year-old Olu Campbell, of Laurel, was sentenced in December to four years and six months in prison.
The men were indicted in December 2009 and convicted by a jury in federal court in Baltimore last June.