Howard R. Shmuckler of Virginia Beach, Va. has been sentenced to 90 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release, for running a fraudulent mortgage rescue business that received substantial fees, but actually modified clients' mortgages in only a few cases. The court ordered that this sentence be served consecutive to a 75-month federal sentence Shmuckler received on April 5, 2012, in Washington, D.C., involving a counterfeit check scheme.
"At a time when homeowners across the nation are struggling to keep their homes, Shmuckler actively targeted the most vulnerable of them with his mortgage modification scam," said Christy Romero, Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (SIGTARP). "Shmuckler exploited homeowners desperately seeking support through federal housing programs such as HAMP by essentially guaranteeing the homeowners mortgage modifications in exchange for an upfront fee. Shmuckler performed little if any service in return for the fees, and in many cases, the homeowners' properties fell into foreclosure. SIGTARP and its partners in law enforcement will aggressively shut down these scams and hold their perpetrators accountable for their crimes."
On April 10 of this year, Shmuckler pled guilty to six counts of wire fraud. According court records, Shmuckler, a convicted felon and disbarred attorney, owned and operated a Vienna, Va.-based mortgage rescue business known as The Shmuckler Group (TSG). From June 2008 through March 2009, TSG took in nearly $2.8 million from approximately 865 clients whose mortgages were in distress and who came to Shmuckler looking for relief. Shmuckler aggressively recruited new clients and pocketed their money while pretending he was successful, was an attorney, and that the business had restructured hundreds of mortgages, stopped hundreds of foreclosures, and negotiated hundreds of short sales. In reality, TSG was able to obtain relief for approximately 4.5 percent of its clients.
Court records indicate that Shmuckler instructed clients to terminate contact with their mortgage companies and to stop making payments to their lenders. TSG never facilitated a modification of the mortgages referenced in the statement of facts filed with his plea agreement.
