The Guyanese man who was wanted by the FBI in connection with a US$7M mortage scam, was captured on Wednesday last, according to the Daily News.
Ishwardat (Danny) Raghunath was nabbed at around 4 pm at Logan and Fulton Streets in East New York after investigators received a tip, FBI spokesman James Margolin told the Daily News.
The report said that Raghunath, 46, a Guyanese national, allegedly recruited straw buyers to purchase homes and then submitted bogus loan applications lenders who were left in the lurch when the mortgage payments stopped.
In exchange for a US$5000 fee for using their names, the buyers were promised that they would not have to make payments on these “investment opportunities,” his indictment says.
Raghunath submitted bogus mortgage applications to lenders, inflating the sales price of the properties, then deposited the loan money in a bank account he controlled. After several months the mortgage payments stopped, and the lenders brought foreclosure actions against the buyers, the Daily News reported.
Two co-defendants in the $7 million scheme – Halal Hahmed, 40, of the Bronx, and Phyllis Seemongal, 49, of Queens – were arrested last week and are free on bail.
