A former Las Vegas real estate agent was sentenced to nearly 22 years in federal prison Friday or masterminding a mortgage fraud scheme that cost financial institutions more than $24 million.
Senior U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt on Friday also ordered Brett Depue of Gilbert, Ariz., to pay $1.6 million in restitution, according to a Las Vegas Review-Journal report.
Depue, 38, who enlisted his friends and family members in the massive conspiracy, was sentenced to serve five years of supervised release after he gets out of prison.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Sarah Griswold said 102 homes in the Las Vegas Valley were fraudulently bought during Depue's scheme to defraud the federally insured banks between 2005 and 2007. The mortgages totaled roughly $53 million.
Depue was also accused of conspiring to recruit buyers with good credit to purchase around 100 homes with mortgage applications containing false information, then renting the properties before selling them at a profit.
Prosecutors say he acknowledged making as much as $13 million off the scheme through investment companies he operated from 2005 to 2007.
