The Manhattan District Attorney is investigating the alleged employment of undocumented workers and payment of substandard wages at projects run by Atlantic Development. Peter Fine, founder of Atlantic, is also the producer of Broadway’s “In the Heights.” Sources told the New York Post that investigators have been asking laborers about Atlantic’s wages and hiring practices. The company, which uses many subcontractors, develops affordable and low-income housing. Prosecutors raided Atlantic Development’s office in April. The company’s Boricua Village project in the Melrose neighborhood of the Bronx opened several months ago. [more]

Thirteen individuals and one mortgage origination company were indicted
today in a mortgage fraud scheme involving more than $100 million,
according to a press release from the Manhattan District Attorney’s
office. Twelve other people have already pleaded guilty to felonies in
the case. The defendants include principals and employees of the
mortgage company, AFG Financial Group, bank employees, appraisers and
attorneys. The crimes took place between June 2004 and April 2009, and
the fraudulent closings took place between mid-2005 and the end of
2007, according to the press release. AFG allegedly paid people to find
distressed properties and straw buyers for them. AFG is accused of
failing to make mortgage payments on the properties, ruining the straw
buyers’ credit ratings and sending the sellers’ homes into foreclosure. TRD [more]

Bronx resident Amadou Lamoudi was indicted today after allegedly
directing a fraudulent scheme in which he helped unqualified tenants
file false applications for apartments subsidized by the Housing
Development Corporation, according to a press release from the
Manhattan District Attorney’s office. Lamoudi, 39, would allegedly
charge ineligible applicants $1,000 or more to help them with their
apartment applications. Lamoudi would reportedly tell them to falsify
their income information and then, when they were selected by the
lottery to continue with the apartment application process, would
direct them to others who would create false financial documents.
Lamoudi has lived in an HDC apartment since 2003, according to the
press release. The number of housing applications with which Lamoudi
was involved was not revealed. TRD [more]

Atlantic
Development Group, one of the city’s largest affordable housing
developers, filed lawsuits against developers Larry Silverstein and the
Moinian Group. Atlantic, which is under investigation by the Manhattan
District Attorney’s office, is suing the developers for allegedly
failing to deliver money that Atlantic planned to use to build
low-income housing projects in Hell’s Kitchen and the South Bronx. In
the two separate filings, Atlantic is seeking $3 million from Moinian
and an unspecified amount from Silverstein. “These were firm contracts
on which Atlantic made commitments to build affordable housing and it
is merely trying to collect the damages rightfully due by contract,”
said an Atlantic spokesperson in a statement.