Federal charges have been filed against a 49-year old Akron area man charging him for his alleged role in a mortgage fraud scheme that resulted in $36-million in losses.
Jack R. Coppenger, Jr. is among more than 40 people who have been charged for their roles in the mortgage fraud schemes. Coppenger was charged with one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud and to make false statements to influence a bank to make a loan in connection with a mortgage fraud scheme involving property in Florida. In a second count, Coppenger is charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States by impairing and impeding the ability of the I.R.S to assess his taxes in 2006 by concealing funds Coppenger received from a land“flip.”
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News Release from the United States Attorney Northern District Of Ohio
A two-count information was filed against Jack R. Coppenger, Jr., age 49 of the Akron, Ohio, area charging him for his roles in a mortgage fraud scheme that resulted in losses of approximately $36 million, said Steven M. Dettelbach, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio.
More than 40 people have been charged for their roles in the mortgage fraud schemes. Coppenger, 49, of the Akron, Ohio, area, was charged with one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud and to make false statements to influence a bank to make a loan in connection with a mortgage fraud scheme involving property in Florida. In the second count, Coppenger is charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States by impairing and impeding the ability of theI.R.S to assess Coppenger’s taxes in 2006 by concealing funds Coppenger received from a land “flip” conducted by Andrew Norman and Jason Herceg (previously charged), as discussed below.
Count one of the information charges that Coppenger, along with mortgage brokers Norman and Herceg, who were operating under the name of V.P. Equity LLC., and a coconspirator known as I.O. (not charged) in procuring “straw buyers” and submitting false loan documents to banks to purchase Coppenger’s lots in Florida (which had already been inflated in value as part of a land flip) in a mortgage fraud scheme. According to the information, Coppenger, with assistance from Herceg and Norman, perpetrated a large mortgage fraud scheme involving numerous straw buyers primarily from the Akron, Hartville, and Mentor Ohio area. These straw buyers essentially sold their good credit scores to Coppenger in order for Coppenger to secure loans, through straw buyers’ names, for properties in Florida. Coppenger promised the straw buyers that if they signed the loan application and paperwork, Coppenger would pay them an inducement amount. Coppenger then promised the straw buyers that he would make all the mortgage payments for the property and would make any down payments that were necessary, and that, once the property was developed and sold, they would split the profits equally. On the face of it, the straw buyers would receive money up front from Coppenger, make no payments out of pocket and receive 50 percent of the profit from the sale of the property at the tail end of the transaction. Herceg and Norman were mentored by Coppenger in the recruitment and use of straw buyers. They assisted Coppenger by using their brokerage company, V.P. Equity, located in the Stow, Ohio, area to prepare and submit falsified loan documents to various banks, which fraudulently inflated the income and assets of the straw buyers in order to qualify them for these loans.
Ultimately, Coppenger failed to make the mortgage payments on these loans, resulting in a loss of approximately $36 million, according to the information.
Herceg and Norman, have been charged in separately filed informations of conspiring to defraud two elderly purchasers by selling them a piece of Florida property for $7 million.
