Two arrested, one of the accused remains at large.
AB Wire
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NEW YORK: Three Indian Americans from Orange County, New York, have been charged with $2.5 million fraud involving fraudulent loans to banks and credit unions throughout the Northeast.
Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Philip R. Bartlett, Inspector-in-Charge of the New York Office of the United States Postal Inspection Service (“USPIS”), and Thomas E. Bishop, Acting Special Agent-in-Charge of the New York Field Office of the Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigation Division (“IRS-CI”) announced the arrests of Binder Tal, Baldev Tal, and Shariful Mintu on bank fraud and money laundering charges.
Baldev Tal was arrested in Orefield, Pennsylvania and appeared in Philadelphia federal court, on Tuesday. Mintu was arrested in Orange County. Binder Tal remains at large.
“For years, banks, credit unions, and small businesses have lost millions of dollars because of the fraud allegedly perpetrated by the defendants in this case,” said Bharara in a statement.
From at least in or about 2007 through in or about July 2015, the trio fraudulently obtained loans and lines of credit from banks, credit unions, and other lending institutions. The defendants obtained the loans by providing materially false information to the lenders about the borrowers’ assets, including false information about the borrowers’ employment and income. Through their scheme, the defendants and their co-conspirators fraudulently obtained more than $2.5 million in proceeds in connection with dozens of loan applications and applications for lines of credit. The vast majority of the loans and lines of credit went into default, and millions of dollars were not repaid.
As part of their fraud scheme, the defendants used the proceeds to personally enrich themselves and their families. They used their proceeds for, among other things, (i) credit card debts for personal expenses; (ii) debts arising from business expenses; and (iii) debts arising from other fraudulently obtained loans, to conceal the fraudulent nature of these loans.
In addition, the defendants and their co-conspirators also engaged in extensive efforts to perpetuate and conceal the fraudulent scheme. These efforts included members of the conspiracy acting as the borrowers for different loans, falsely claiming that the purpose of the loans was to purchase or finance used luxury automobiles. In fact, many of the automobiles were never purchased or leased by the defendants or their co-conspirators, and the loan proceeds were later distributed to other members of the conspiracy and to entities they controlled.
The trio each face a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison on the charge of conspiring to commit bank fraud and a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison on the charge of conspiring to commit money laundering.