Crime & Safety
Broadlands Woman Convicted in Mortgage Fraud Scheme
Loan officer and her two co-conspirators defrauded lenders out of millions by falsifying loan documents involving dozens of Ashburn homes.
A Broadlands, Va. woman who worked as a mortgage loan officer in both Fairfax and Herndon was convicted by a federal jury Friday for her part in a large-scale mortgage fraud scheme that involved 36 Ashburn homes.
Ging-Hwang “Felicia” Tsoa, 59, was convicted of conspiracy to commit bank fraud and two counts of bank fraud, and faces a maximum penalty of 30 years on each count when she is sentenced this coming February.
According to a news release by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Tsoa used her position as a loan officer at First Empire Mortgage in Fairfax and Lifetime Financial Services in Herndon "to defraud mortgage lenders as part of a scheme to profit from fraudulently obtained mortgage loans and the purchase of residential real estate in Northern Virginia."
As part of the scheme, authorities report that Tsoa's co-conspirator Robert Mikail recruited five individuals, known as “straw buyers,” to serve as nominal purchasers in these transactions. Tsoa worked with Mikail and their other co-conspirator, Bing-Sing “Cindy” Wang, the owner of Lifetime Financial Services, to "falsify critical information on the straw buyers’ loan applications in order to get the loans approved and the transactions closed."
"In particular, virtually all the fraudulent loan applications falsely identified Mikail’s Ashburn jewelry store, Opus Jewelry, as the borrower’s employer, which the conspirators would then falsely verify to the lenders as part of the loan approval process," FBI officers said in a statement.
In total, the conspiracy involved the purchase of approximately 36 homes in Ashburn from 2005 through 2007 and approximately $19.9 million in loan proceeds disbursed on the basis of the fraudulent loan applications.
According to the evidence at trial, Tsoa served as the loan officer on at least nine of these transactions, which resulted in approximately $1.4 million in losses to lenders.
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Co-conspirator Wang pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge on Nov. 20, 2012, and was sentenced to 24 months in prison in February of this year.
Co-conspirator Mikail pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge in July of this year and is due to be sentenced on Jan. 10.
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