The first of several events focusing on mortgage fraud was attended today by the U.S. Department of Justice, bank representatives and mortgage lenders.
Today’s event was held in Miami, the Justice Department announced. Representatives of the Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force met with members of the Miami community including representatives from banks, mortgage companies and real estate firms.
Multiple panels covered the impact mortgage fraud has on communities.
The task force was established in November 2009 by the Barack Obama administration “to wage an aggressive, coordinated and proactive effort to investigate and prosecute financial crimes,” the statement said. Task force members include representatives from an array of federal agencies, regulatory authorities, inspectors general and state and local law enforcement.
The event, which is the first in a series of three mortgage fraud summits, was held in Miami because of the high degree of mortgage fraud in the region.
Florida’s attorney general said in the statement that the state’s mortgage fraud crisis is “similar to a state of emergency.”
But accompanying the high level of activity has been the prosecution of 282 people who were tied to $343,669,434 in fraudulent loans since September 2007, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida Jeffrey H. Sloman said in the news release.
In addition to the U.S. and Florida justice departments, participating in the summit were Inspector General of the Department of Housing and Urban Development Kenneth M. Donohue, FinCEN Director James H. Freis Jr. and representatives from the U.S. Secret Service, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and Miami-Dade Police Department.
