The FBI said its 1,204 pending
mortgage fraud cases resulted in 321 indictments,
206 convictions, $595.9 million in restitution
orders, and $21.8 million in recoveries in 2007.
The Bureau’s Financial Crimes Report to
the Public, Fiscal Year 2007 said 80% of
all reported mortgage fraud losses involved
collusion or collaboration by industry insiders.
The FBI says the true level of mortgage fraud is
probably unknown because of a lack of mandatory
reporting in much of the industry. In addition,
the repackaging and sale of mortgages on the
secondary market can conceal and distort the
fraud, causing it to go unreported. Among
other statistics in the report:
The FBI pursued 529 corporate fraud
cases, several of which involve losses to public
investors that individually exceed $1 billion.
FBI securities and commodities fraud
cases increased to 1,217 in 2007 from 937 in 2003,
and resulted in $24 million in recoveries, $1.7
billion in restitution orders, and $202.7 million
in fines in 2007.
The FBI investigated 548 money
laundering cases, resulting in 141 indictments,
112 convictions, $66.9 million in restitution
orders, $2.2 million in recoveries, and $11.4
million in fines. The report is available
at www.fbi.gov/publications/financial/fcs_report2007/financial_crime_2007.htm
.
Suspicious Activity Reports related
to mortgage fraud grew 42% in 2007, according to
The SAR Activity Review—By the Numbers,
Issue 10 , compiled by the Financial Crimes
Enforcement Network. Although growth of SARs
related to mortgage fraud was off from the peak
growth of 93% in 2004, reports have increased more
than 40% in each of the last three years.
FinCEN reported a 7% drop in reported instances
of terrorist financing in 2007. This area has been
trending down since 2004. Growth of SARs
from money services businesses slowed to 17% in
2007, down from 41% in 2004 and 29% in both 2005
and 2006. The U.S. Postal Service, which accounted
for 24% of all reports from money services
businesses, saw a 102% spike in total reports in
2007. Money orders constituted 40% of all SARs by
money services businesses. The Postal Service
issues more than 500,000 money orders daily.
The report is available at www.fincen.gov
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