Jacqueline Graham, Mortgage Elimination Scheme, New York 2019

NEW YORK - Jacqueline Graham, 54, formerly of Antioch, California, and Levittown, Pennsylvania, was sentenced to 132 months, or 11 years, in prison for her role in a $38 million fraudulent mortgage debt elimination scheme.

Graham, who was convicted in June 2019 after a two-week trial, was also sentenced to five years of supervised release and ordered to pay restitution to her victims in the amount of $694,450 and forfeiture of $138,941.86.

The scheme, which was operated by Terra Foundation, a Valhalla, New York-based company, involved performing 'audits' of clients' mortgages, sending pseudo-legal paperwork to the banks and/or lenders holding the mortgages, and ultimately filing purported mortgage discharges with the relevant county clerks' offices.

The mortgages had not been discharged, and the mortgages were eventually reinstated, after the clients paid their fees. In total, Graham and her co-conspirators filed over 60 fraudulent discharges in Westchester and Putnam Counties in New York, and in Connecticut.

The fraudulent discharges claimed to discharge mortgages with a total loan principal of nearly $38 million. 'Jacqueline Graham brazenly defrauded vulnerable homeowners during the housing crisis by falsely promising that, for substantial fees, she could make millions of dollars of their mortgage debt disappear,' said Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman.

'In reality, she pilfered her victims' money, leaving them far worse off, and some ended up losing their homes. Now Graham will spend 11 years in federal prison for preying upon her many victims,' Berman added.

Source: https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/owner-fraudulent-mortgage-elimination-company-sentenced-11-years-prison-38-million