A New Jersey real estate investor pleaded guilty last week to conspiracy to commit wire fraud in a $1 million mortgage scheme.
Cabral Simpson, a 46-year-old resident of Orange, New Jersey, admitted to collaborating with co-conspirators in fabricating bank statements and fake employee verification records for prospective property buyers, the U.S. Department of Justice said in a press release.
They also transferred funds into the buyers’ bank accounts as deposits for property purchases.
Furthermore, Simpson and his co-conspirators submitted fraudulent mortgage loan applications, along with forged supporting documents and closing paperwork on behalf of these buyers, inducing lenders to issue more than $1 million in loans, which subsequently led to defaults.
The defaults exposed both the lenders and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to losses exceeding $1 million.
Conspiracy to commit wire fraud carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a fine, which can be either $250,000, twice the gross profits derived from the scheme, or twice the gross loss suffered by the victims.
Simpson’s sentencing is scheduled for Jan. 10, 2024.
Simpson isn’t the only real estate-related person to have a brush with the New Jersey District of the U.S. Department of Justice.
Contractor Joel Konopka, 45, of Elizabeth, New Jersey, was charged last month with four counts of corporate tax evasion, two counts of filing false corporate tax returns, and two counts of failing to file corporate tax returns, according to a U.S. Department of Justice.
Konopka was the owner and sole shareholder of Konopka Construction, a company providing construction, contracting, and snow plowing services in northern New Jersey from 2014 to 2017.
According to court documents, Konopka allegedly failed to file truthful and accurate corporate tax returns for his company during that period, despite earning over $3.3 million in business income between 2014 and 2017, including more than $1 million in 2016.
Konopka did not report this income accurately. Instead, he filed corporate tax returns for 2014 and 2015 that reported no income for his company, and he failed to file any corporate tax returns for 2016 and 2017. Additionally, Konopka is accused of not making any payments to the IRS for corporate taxes during these years.