Crime & Safety

Forest Hills Lawyers Busted in Mortgage Fraud

Attorneys with local practice illegally obtained $25 million in loans.

Two attorneys with a Forest Hills practice were convicted of mortgage fraud this week, according to the U.S. Attorney in Brooklyn.

Matthew Burstein and Aaron Rabinowitz, both 40, were found guilty on ten felony counts of fraud for illegally obtaining $25 million in loans from half a dozen lending agencies, including Countrywide and Wells Fargo, part of a Byzantine scheme to enrich themselves in the midst of a down housing market. 

According to U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch, the defendants worked with a co-conspirator network of straw buyers and real estate agents to draw up dummy sale documents for homes in Brooklyn, Queens and Long Island. They would then file for mortgages and pay themselves attorney's fees from the falsified loans.

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The incidents took place between January 2006 and September 2008.

“The defendants violated the trust placed in them as attorneys and further damaged the integrity of the real estate market,” Lynch said. “We will vigorously investigate and prosecute those who engage in mortgage fraud, including professionals who jettison their responsibility to reap rewards from the fraud.”

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The crooked attorneys were caught after an investigation by the FBI and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., which monitors lending activity.

Burstein and Rabinowitz are scheduled for sentencing on Nov. 26. They face a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison. They will also likely be forced to pay restitution on any ill-gotten gains from the fraudulent home sales they perpetrated. 


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