'At Home Settlements' Owner Pleaded Guilty to Stealing Millions In Mortgage Pay-Offs

The United States Attorney for Maryland Rod J. Rosenstein announced on Friday that Gary Pierce of Edgewater has pleaded guilty to attempting to conceal a fraud scheme totalling nearly $5 million.

Pierce, 44, owned and operated At Home Settlements, LCC, a real estate title agency with an office in Gambrills, Maryland. For five years, the U.S. Attorney said that Pierce made monthly mortgage payments to lenders whose mortgages should have been paid off at settlement. Instead, Pierce would hold the mortgage payoff funds from clients' closings. Pierce conducted this scheme on 17 Maryland properties.

The Greater Maryland Better Business Bureau gave this company a "F" Rating

Pierce faces 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. He will be sentenced on Feb. 10 before U.S. District Judge Catherine C. Blake.

The U.S. Attorney's press release said that in 2007, Pierce applied for and received a mortgage on a property in Edgewater that he did not own.

"Pierce used funds obtained from the lender to perpetuate the scheme and diverted $50,000 from the funds provided by the mortgage lender to himself. The true owner of the property had no knowledge that documents were created that purported to show that he had sold the property to Pierce," the release said.

The release said that Pierce diverted or held mortgage payoffs from closings. He did this sometimes for days, weeks and even years, falsely representing on HUD-1 forms that the payoffs were made.

Pierce and an unnamed co-conspirator would create profiles for the borrower to stop mail from being sent to the real borrower's address, and redirecting correspondence to a post office box owned by Pierce.

Pierce would continue making the monthly payments, so there would be no delinquency in the mortgage accounts. But, because these mortgages were not paid off, liens were not removed and clear title could not be passed to the new lender or borrower.

"The total amount of diverted or otherwise improperly obtained funds totals $4,971,38," the release said.

Rosenstein announced the plea Friday and thanked

• Special Agent in Charge Richard A. McFeely of the Federal Bureau of Investigation;
• Special Agent in Charge Kenneth R. Taylor, Jr. of the Housing and Urban Development Office of Inspector General - Office of Investigations;
• Howard County Police Chief William McMahon.
• Assistant U.S. Attorney Leo J. Wise, who is prosecuting the case.

The charge was brought forth with the help of the Maryland Mortgage Fraud Task Force, which was established to unify the agencies that regulate and investigate mortgage fraud and promote the early detection, identification, prevention and prosecution of mortgage fraud schemes.

"This case, as well as other cases brought by members of the Task Force, demonstrates the commitment of law enforcement agencies to protect consumers from fraud and promote the integrity of the credit markets," the release said.

Information about mortgage fraud prosecutions as part of President Barack Obama’s Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force are available online. President Obama established the interagency Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force to wage an aggressive, coordinated and proactive effort to investigate and prosecute financial crimes.