A group of alleged Maryland foreclosure swindlers has been charged with using television advertisements to entice desperate homeowners into turning over their deeds as a last-ditch effort to save their homes from being returned to the bank, a federal prosecutor said Wednesday.
The group of four, led by Upper Marlboro lawyer Michael K. Lewis, 56, promised in advertisements that it could improve the credit and save the homes of the financially troubled, but once the deeds were signed over, Lewis and the others sucked up cash payments and eventually allowed the properties to go into default or sold them, according to the federal grand jury indictment.
Between fall 2004 and May 2008, Lewis would tell callers responding to the advertisements that they could turn over their deeds and engage in a “lease/buy back” program that used his brother Ernest Lewis’ “good credit” to temporarily refinance their homes. The homeowners were told they could repurchase their property in roughly a year, the indictment said.
Prosecutors claim the alleged scam followed a predictable pattern.
Once a lease was signed over to the Lewis brothers, operating as MKL Associates, Cheryl Brooke, 51, of Upper Marlboro, would file bankruptcy documents in the names of the former homeowners to delay foreclosure.
Meanwhile, Earnest Lewis, 59, of Takoma Park, and Winston Thomas, 42, of New Carrollton, would submit fake financial and employment information to mortgage lenders to secure the cash needed for obtaining the soon-to-be-foreclosed properties. Once the cash was in hand, Brooke would file motions to dismiss the bankruptcy cases so the homes could be sold.
The former homeowners were then told they could stay in their houses by paying rent to Ernest Lewis.
Cash obtained through the rent and MKL Associates fees was deposited in a bank account belonging to Michael Lewis’ In The House Technologies.
Prosecutors claim the four netted at least $2.9 million.
“The mortgage fraud conspiracy cases that we are prosecuting in Maryland should serve both to hold criminals accountable and to warn homeowners about the many smooth-talking con artists who take advantage of people who fall behind on their mortgage payments,” said U.S. Attorney for the District of Maryland Rod J. Rosenstein. “No matter how bad your financial situation may seem, signing your house over to a con artist will make it worse.”
