Angel Garcia-Oliver, 49, Miami, Florida, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bank and wire fraud. He faces a maximum penalty of 30 years in federal prison.
According to the plea agreement, Garcia-Oliver was the principal of Garcia-Oliver & Mainieri, P.A., a law firm located in Coral Gables, Florida. Tribute Residential, LLC, which was owned by a co-conspirator, owned and sold multiple communities. Garcia-Oliver, or employees working at his direction, served as settlement agents and conducted dozens of real estate closings for condominium units owned by Tribute, including Cypress Pointe in Orlando, Florida and the Villas at Lakeside in Oviedo, Florida.
To attract buyers to these communities, co-conspirators advertised that Tribute would pay the mortgage and homeowners’ association dues for the buyer during the first two years of occupancy. In addition, buyers were promised that renters, who would pay rent that would equal the mortgage and HOA payments, were ready to live in the units. Other incentives, at times, included upfront cash for the buyers to close on the unit and/or kickbacks to buyers after closing. In each of these transactions, the HUD-1 Settlement Statement contained falsified information regarding the down payment actually paid by the buyers.
In order to conceal from the mortgage lenders that Tribute, or entities controlled by other co-conspirators, provided the cash to close and other undisclosed incentives to buyers, Garcia-Oliver formed CSF Management LLC. CSF’s bank accounts received monies from Tribute. Those funds were eventually paid to the buyers and entities controlled by other co-conspirators. The fact that co-conspirators were paying the cash to close, and other incentives to the buyers through CSF, was not disclosed to the lenders on the HUD-1 Settlement Statement.
In order to conceal from the mortgage lenders that Tribute was paying undisclosed leaseback payments (“kickbacks”) to buyers, Garcia-Oliver formed Southeast Administration Group, LLC. He used the Southeast Administration bank accounts to pay kickbacks to borrowers, which were also not disclosed to the mortgage lenders.
The losses suffered by the mortgage lenders that are attributable to Garcia-Oliver’s conduct exceed $8.25 million.
United States Attorney A. Lee Bentley, III announced the guilty plea. The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Florida Office of Financial Regulation, and the Federal Housing Finance Agency – Office of Inspector General. It is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Vincent Chiu and Special Assistant United States Attorney Chris Poor.
