California Woman Charged With Inflating Income in Mortgage Fraud Case

A federal grand jury has indicted Monica Elizabeth Frommer of Sherman Oaks, Calif. for her role in a $2 million mortgage fraud scheme in which she allegedly filed fraudulent loan applications that in some cases falsely claimed she and her husband earned nearly $50,000 per month. Frommer was indicted Nov. 9 on charges of bank fraud, loan fraud, wire fraud, and making unlawful monetary transactions. Frommer surrendered to federal authorities and pleaded not guilty to the 12 counts in the indictment. Frommer is currently scheduled to go on trial on Jan. 11, but at a court hearing, attorneys discussed delaying the trial until March. If convicted of the dozen charges in the indictment, Frommer would face a statutory maximum sentence of 290 years in federal prison. According to the indictment, from mid-2004 through mid-2007, Frommer submitted at least six fraudulent mortgage loan applications to National City Bank and Washington Mutual Bank. On these loan applications, which were “stated income” applications, Frommer allegedly falsely inflated her income, claiming that she and her husband earned as much as $47,500 per month. The indictment also alleges that Frommer caused phony bank records to be submitted to a lender to verify assets that she claimed to possess. As a result of the fraudulent loan applications, the two victim banks funded loans totaling approximately $2 million. The indictment alleges that Frommer used most of the mortgage loan proceeds to finance residential construction and to repay earlier mortgage loans. Frommer also used proceeds of the fraud for her own personal benefit and to finance vacations for her family. For more information, visit http://losangeles.fbi.gov.