Vallejo Business Owner Sentenced For Multimillion Dollar Mortgage And Foreclosure Rescue Fraud Schem

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https://www.justice.gov/usao-edca/pr/vallejo-business-owner-sentenced-multimillion-dollar-mortgage-and-foreclosure-rescue

Department of Justice
U.S. Attorney’s Office
Eastern District of California

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, November 2, 2018

Vallejo Business Owner Sentenced For Multimillion Dollar Mortgage And Foreclosure Rescue Fraud Schem

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Sergio Roman Barrientos, 64, of Poway, was sentenced today by U.S. District Judge Garland E. Burrell Jr. to 14 years in prison for conspiring to commit wire fraud affecting a financial institution and bank fraud, U.S. Attorney McGregor W. Scott announced.

According to court documents, from about September 2004 through February 2008, Barrientos and co-conspirators Zalathiel Aguila and Omar Anabo operated an entity named Capital Access LLC, in Vallejo. They preyed on homeowners nearing foreclosure, convinced them to sign away title in their homes, spent any equity those homeowners had saved, and used straw buyers to defraud federally insured financial institutions out of millions of dollars in home loans obtained under false pretenses. The equity stripped from the distressed homeowners’ properties was then used for operational expenses of the scheme and personal expenses of Barrientos and his coconspirators. Vulnerable homeowners across California lost their homes and savings as a result of the scheme, and lenders lost an estimated $10.47 million from the fraud.