Boy-band mogul faces charge of bank fraud

Federal authorities in Orlando, Fla., allege the creator of the Backstreet Boys and 'N Sync defrauded a bank by securing nearly $20 million in personal and business loans with fake documents from a nonexistent accounting firm.

Lou Pearlman, who had been in hiding for several months, was found in Indonesia and expelled from the country Thursday. He was handed over to the FBI, who took him to the U.S. territory of Guam to appear before a federal judge on a bank fraud charge. Pearlman was held over Friday for another hearing next week.

In a criminal complaint filed in March and unsealed after Pearlman's arrest, an FBI investigator said the boy-band mogul used an accounting firm named Cohen & Siegel to prepare documents for lenders and investors. Authorities said the firm appears to be nonexistent, and was created by Pearlman or his associates.