Mineola real estate lawyer Eric Finger, 47, was sentenced in Manhattan federal court last week to four years in prison for his role in a $9 million mortgage fraud scheme
U.S. District Judge Naomi R. Buchwald also ordered Finger to forfeit $7.2 million for his role in a scheme that defrauded various lending institutions by using fictitious and fraudulent “straw identities” to apply for mortgage loans.
“Eric Finger’s sentence is a fitting conclusion for a man who abused his license to practice law and disgraced the bar by helping to facilitate a multi-million dollar fraud scheme. He has now lost his liberty and will forfeit millions in ill-gotten gains,” said Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara.
]In addition to the prison term and forfeiture, Buchwald sentenced Finger to three years of supervised release, and ordered him to pay a $200 special assessment fee.
According to the indictment and statements made in court proceedings, Finger acted as the lender’s counsel on many of the fraudulent transactions. He disbursed fraudulently obtained mortgage proceeds to co-conspirators and lied to his clients about the fraudulent nature of those transactions. He also misrepresented the identities of the individuals who were actually receiving the loan proceeds, as well as the amounts they received, court documents revealed.
Finger and his co-conspirators were able to obtain more than $9 million in mortgage loans for the purchase of dozens of residential properties throughout the New York City metropolitan area and Long Island. Most of the loans quickly went into default.
Co-defendants Jeffrey Larochelle, Denise Parks, Frederick Warren, Joell Barnett, Foriduzzaman Sarder, Sakat Hossain, Mikael Huq, Fritz Bonaventure, Dorian Brown, and Reginald Johnson previously pled guilty in the case. Sarder was sentenced to 78 months in prison; Hossain was sentenced to 29 months in prison; Huq was sentenced to 42 months in prison; Parks was sentenced to time served; Warren was sentenced to 51 months in prison; Bonaventure was sentenced to three months in prison; Brown was sentenced to four months in prison; and Johnson was sentenced to 51 months in prison. Larochelle and Barnett await sentencing.
