Illinois Man Charged in Four Separate Cases Involving Pensacola Real Estate Deals
A real estate entrepreneur who was currently under contract to publish a book on real estate transactions and purchasing distressed mortgages from banks was charged in four separate cases in Pensacola. He was accused of trading worthless land in Oklahoma for FEMA trailers, misrepresenting and trading unbuildable lots in Pensacola for homes and land, selling properties without a license, helping buyers obtain fraudulent mortgages to purchase his inventory of properties by wiring large cash deposits into their accounts to qualify them and selling properties he had a contractual right to purchase before he owned them. In addition to the four cases, the State attempted to bring in evidence of prior bad acts he had been investigated for eight years earlier by the FBI and HUD in Lehigh Acres, Florida. He had been investigated for intentionally destroying HUD homes so he would weed out any competitive bidders, selling homes purported to be income producing by stocking his properties with fictitious renters and creating false land values by controlling areas of land.
He came to the attention of Pensacola prosecutors when several people independent of each other went to the authorities complaining they had been defrauded.
After an extensive investigation, we were able to show the prosecutors that in one case the alleged victim was a highly sophisticated real estate investor who purchases and sells land in several states and the purported maps had been doctored by him instead of our client. In the second case we were able to show that it was a business deal where one party made out better than the other and that both cases were civil in nature; they dismissed both.
The third case went to trial and the client was acquitted of all counts. The state dismissed the fourth case shortly after the acquittal notifying the court in a pleading that there was no likelihood of conviction due to the acquittal.