Miami Herald's 'Borrowers Betrayed' series is honored

[seafan]

Congratulations to the Miami Herald for this explosive investigative series written last year.


Miami Herald's 'Borrowers Betrayed' series is honored


March 13, 2009


Miami Herald Staff Report

The Miami Herald's Jack Dolan, Matthew Haggman and Rob Barry won one of the nation's most prestigious journalism awards for their stories last year revealing the state's failure to police Florida's troubled mortgage industry.

The reporters received the Scripps Howard Foundation National Journalism Award for investigative reporting for their series, Borrowers Betrayed, showing that state regulators allowed thousands of people with criminal histories -- including armed robbers and cocaine traffickers -- to work in the mortgage industry since 2000. The newspaper found that those felons went on to steal more than $85 million from borrowers and lenders. The series was edited by Investigations Editor Michael Sallah. The Miami Herald team will accept the foundation's Ursula and Gilbert Farfel prize next month during a dinner in Washington, D.C. The award comes with a $25,000 prize.

.....

The Herald series showed that regulators failed to alert police agencies to crooked mortgage brokerages, ignored citizen complaints and dropped investigations into shoddy operations while the state was struggling with the highest rate of mortgage fraud in the country.

The stories prompted the resignation of Florida's top financial industry regulator and tougher laws in screening and licensing people who sell mortgages.

Borrowers Betrayed: Miami Herald Investigative Series


Part 1: The Brokers


Tampa resident Louise Winters tried to get her house fixed up but ended up as a victim of a mortgage fraud.
CHUCK FADELY / MIAMI HERALD STAFF




Part 2: The Originators


Kafka, left. Rolle, right.




Part 3: The Probe


Janice Scott-Kittles stands in front of a house that was formerly owned by her now-deceased mother, Hazel Nichols Scott, but was lost in a mortgage fraud scheme. CARL JUSTE/MIAMI HERALD STAFF




Part 4: Ongoing Coverage




Thousands with criminal records were allowed to work unlicensed as loan originators

.....

More than half the mortgage professionals registered in Florida -- 120,563 -- entered the industry this decade without being licensed by the state, The Miami Herald found.
Known as loan originators, they perform the same job as mortgage brokers but aren't bound by the same rules.

Time and again, industry leaders asked Florida regulators to bring this group under their watch by imposing mandatory licensing. But regulators refused to press for any changes, claiming that lawmakers would never approve.
The state's refusal proved costly during the biggest housing boom in Florida history: Thousands of loan originators entered the industry with criminal histories, state records show.

.....

A review of thousands of pages of court documents, state industry reports, internal e-mails and police reports shows that from 2000 to 2007:

• 5,306 people with criminal histories became loan originators -- a rate of nearly two a day. Worse, those include 2,201 who had committed financial crimes, such as fraud, money laundering and grand theft.

• Even large lenders hired loan originators with criminal backgrounds. The Miami Herald found that in at least 30 companies with 50 or more employees, more than one in five originators had a criminal record.

• Nearly two dozen people stripped of their licenses as mortgage brokers were able to sidestep regulators by becoming loan originators. Nine others who were denied licenses because of prior crimes or regulatory violations were able to do the same.

.....

As the housing boom exploded in 2001, so did the number of people rushing into the mortgage industry, with loan originators leading the way. But as their numbers rose each year -- 66 a day in 2005 -- so did the number of former criminals.
With home sales rising more than 20 percent a year in parts of Florida, mortgage companies were hiring loan originators at an unprecedented rate, state records show.

''Back then, it was such a feeding frenzy,'' said David Velazquez, 37, a former loan originator in Broward who served time in prison for drug trafficking. 'People were saying, `We need loan originators. We'll train you.' It was so busy. They were pulling in anyone they could.''
In all, more than 5,300 people with criminal histories rushed into Florida's mortgage industry as loan originators since 2000. Even for people who had five or more convictions, there were no impediments to getting in.

Who was Governor during the period of 2000 until 2007?




John Ellis "Jeb" Bush

[ConcernedCanuk]

1. And watch out - Jeb Bush may be the next thug to steal the presidency

.
.
.

All those billions that Dim-Son has spread around are gonna be right behind Jeb's butt

PNACers haven't given up, hell no

They just added BILLIONS to their war-chest for their next takeover

BFEE has got billions to live, plan and scheme on

"THANKS USA taxpayers for your support!"

They will be back,

count on it

(sigh)

[Hello_Kitty]

2. Yet the borrowers are STILL being blamed.

:grr:

[PA Democrat]

3. One in five fraudulent loans originated in Florida

according to the article. That's what happens when business is not regulated.

[seafan]

4. A weekend kick. n/t

[seafan]

5. Armed robbers, cocaine traffickers, money launderers, fraudsters writing mortgages in Jeb!'s Florida

Time and again, industry leaders asked Florida regulators to bring this group under their watch by imposing mandatory licensing. But regulators refused to press for any changes, claiming that lawmakers would never approve.

The state's refusal proved costly during the biggest housing boom in Florida history...

This is what Jeb! and his toxic, de-regulatory Republican legislature brought to Florida. We are rid of him from the governorship, but his Republican sycophantic legislature remains.



We, the voters, know what we have to do.

[myrna minx]

6. I'm looking forward to reading this series. Thanks for posting. n/t