Murrieta husband sentenced to 63 months/wife 48 monts/ Mortgage Fraud Scheme over $1 million in restitution ordered

RIVERSIDE, California –Joe Daniel Cody Jr., 43, of Murrieta was sentenced to 63 months in prison, three years of supervised release and ordered to pay over $1 Million in restitution for conspiracy to money laundering in a mortgage fraud scheme by U.S. District Judge Virginia A. Phillips. Also, Angela Lynette Cody, 38, of Murrieta was sentenced to 48 months in prison, three years of supervised release and ordered to pay over $1 Million in restitution for conspiracy to money laundering in a mortgage fraud scheme, again by U.S. District Judge Virginia A. Phillips.

According to court documents, Joe Cody and Angela Cody were employees of “All Fund Mortgage,” a national mortgage brokerage firm based in Tacoma, Washington, and managed a branch out of their Murrieta residence. As part of the conspiracy, Joe Cody and Angela Cody and others would convince homeowners, primarily in San Bernardino and Riverside counties, to refinance or temporarily sell their homes to others to help them lower their monthly mortgage payments. In furtherance of the scheme, Joe Cody and Angela Cody would convince the homeowner to allow an “investor” (who was really a “straw buyer”) with good credit to be added to the title of their home, telling the homeowner they could then refinance under more favorable terms.

They would then effectuate sales of the properties and cash out the equity at closing once they acquired loans from new lenders based on false and fraudulent information. The Codys and their co-conspirators caused homeowners to lose title to their homes and lenders to hold millions of dollars in bad loans. In most cases, title was never transferred back to the homeowner, and the schemers took the equity out of the property. Few, if any, payments were ever made and the properties were eventually sold or went through foreclosure proceedings.

In furtherance of the scheme, Joe Cody, Angela Cody and others also recruited individuals with good credit to act as straw buyers, offering an opportunity to purchase an investment property with an instant tenant and receiving a “kickback” between $1,000 to $25,000 per property. At least 21 homeowners were victimized in a total of $1,042,866.08.

The investigation was conducted by Internal Revenue Service – Criminal Investigation and the Federal Bureau of Investigation and prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California in Riverside.