Friday, March 07, 2008

First Magnus Settles Dispute With Kansas Broker

First Magnus Financial Corporation and Kansas broker, Kyle Roberson, settled a dispute over conduct that allegedly contributed to damages suffered by First Magnus.  Roberson agreed to pay the sum of $25,000 in an effort to resolve the pending litigation but maintained his position that the claims against him were meritless. Roberson was dismissed from the action, First Magnus Financial Corporation v. Lighthouse Financial Corporation, et al., effective January 30, 2008. 

As previously reported by Mortgage Fraud Blog, First Magnus filed a civil lawsuit in the Kansas US District Court alleging that the following additional defendants engaged in a “mortgage fraud scheme to defraud First Magnus”:

Lighthouse Financial Corporation (Lighthouse), mortgage brokerage that originated the mortgage loans in the Complaint;

Kelly Beaver, owner of Lighthouse and signatory to the broker agreement with First Magnus on behalf of Lighthouse as the “broker of record”;

Kevin Riche, loan officer employee of Lighthouse;

Dave Marshall, loan officer, employee of Lighthouse;

Elizabeth Syakhasone, loan officer, employee of Lighthouse;

Tim Scott, loan officer, employee of Lighthouse;

Tyler Mackey, loan officer, employee of Lighthouse;

Term Investment Group (TIG), appraisal company that is alleged to have performed a number of fraudulent appraisals;

Terrell Ford, owner of TIG;

Maurice Ragland, owner of TIG;

Bill Lima, employee of TIG, is alleged to have performed many of the fraudulent appraisals.  Upon information and belief, the complaint alleges that Bill Lima is a fictitious identity or a victim of identity theft and used Bill Lima’s name when conducting fraudulent appraisals as a means to avoid detection;

Shawn J Allen, real estate appraiser, alleged to have conducted, supervised, or reviewed one of the appraisals;

Mark J Allen, real estate appraiser, alleged to have conducted supervised or reviewed one of the appraisals;

The complaint alleged that Lighthouse, the loan officers, and the appraisers conspired to over-appraise and thus wrongfully inflate the value of residential properties, that Lighthouse and the loan officers misrepresented borrower information in the mortgage loan applications and other documents in the package, including, but not limited to, the borrower’s employment status and the borrower’s monthly income and that Lighthouse and the loan officers used appraisal software to fabricate fraudulent appraisals.

The complaint did not specify the amount of damages claimed.

First Magnus filed for bankruptcy protection in 2007. 

mortgage fraud

1. First Magnus has since developed their own set of problems and the disposition of this case does not surprise me.

   Posted by  on  03/09  at  11:45 AM