Arthur Gonzales Diaz, 56, Anaheim, California, is charged with seven felony counts of grand theft and one misdemeanor count of engaging in business as a real estate broker without a license with a sentencing enhancement for property damage exceeding $65,000. If convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of eight years in state prison. Diaz is being held on $75,000 bail and must prove the

Juan Rangel, 46, Downey, California, has agreed to plead guilty to federal fraud and money laundering charges, admitting that he ran two fraudulent operations-a Ponzi scheme that took in $30 million from more than 300 victims and a mortgage fraud scheme that preyed on homeowners by stealing the equity from their homes and secretly taking title to their properties. Rangel, who is

Kathy Chen, 49, Westminster, California, a real estate broker, was sentenced to 68 years and six months in state prison for conspiring with her boyfriend and his brother to commit $17.5 million in real estate fraud by purchasing 35 properties using stolen identities and intentionally defaulting on loans in order to steal the loan money.

Chen was found guilty by a jury

Bruce Fred Friedman, 60, the owner of a Sherman Oaks, California, company that promised investors healthy returns with claims of a successful business based on the rehabilitation of “scratch and dent” real estate was indicted on federal fraud charges that allege he operated a Ponzi scheme that took in nearly a quarter billion dollars.

Friedman, the operator of

Steven Gutierrez, 58, Moreno Valley, California, was arrested without incident on September 29, 2010, by investigators from the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Real Estate Fraud Unit, outside his workplace in Chino Hills, California. Gutierrez was arrested on felony charges of selling false securities and selling securities without a license.

In 2006, Continue Reading...