Utahns hit hard by costly mortgage scam

So far, the Attorney General's Office has charged between 15 and 20 people with various felony charges, assistant attorney general Richard Hamp said. Eventually, he expects more than 100 people to face state charges of identity theft, communications fraud and theft by deception.

The alleged ring leaders are yet to be charged, although they are the ones suspected of profiting the most from the scheme.

"In this case, it's the . . . mortgage brokers and lenders who were making the money," Hamp said, adding those four or five individuals will likely face federal charges, although he was unsure when those would be filed.

Often in cases of identity theft, thieves obtain a person's private information from documents and other personal data. In this case, however, it appears the perpetrators simply chose numbers at random and generated a Social Security card using the new number and the home buyer's name, Hamp said.

The approach resulted in various people being victimized, and not always those one would expect to be purchasing a home.

"This runs the gamut from Mrs. Vandermyde, who's a Salt Lake grandmother, to a 4-year-old New York girl who bought a house in Ogden," Shurtleff said.

Other Utah victims include a 17-year-old Tremonton girl who fears the scheme will affect her ability to secure student loans and a Weber County woman whose Social Security number was used to finance six homes and obtain an R.C. Willey credit account.

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E-mail: awelling@desnews.com