A former mortgage banker was recently sentenced by a Nevada Judge to more than eight years in prison for wire fraud and money laundering, according to an announcement from the U.S. Attorney’s office. David Allan Van Velzer, Jr., 40, was convicted of twelve counts of wire fraud and seventeen counts of money laundering following a criminal trial in December.
Van Velzer operated his company, American Mortgage Industries, in Las Vegas and southern California. The U.S. Attorney said that between 1996 and 1997, he used lines-of-credit from Imperial Warehouse Lending Group and Bank One Arizona to fund loans that were sold to Freddie Mac and ICI Funding Corporation.
Van Velzer allegedly misrepresented information about his borrowers to facilitate loan transactions, the U.S. Attorney said. The indictment said he used the ill-gotten funds “to operate his mortgage company, to support his lifestyle, and to repay other mortgage companies for other fraudulent loans that he had made,” according to a previous article by the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
Van Velzer’s misrepresentations allegedly included creating false loan documents; showing people as buyers when he knew that they were not actually buying the properties; using fictitious income and assets numbers; presenting vacant pieces of land as residential properties; using inflated property values; and using fraudulently notarized documents.
In addition, the U.S. Attorney said the court found that Van Velzer had obstructed justice by attempting to persuade two people to testify falsely on his behalf.
The Las Vegas Tribune reported in February that Van Velzer filed a civil law suit against a U.S. District Court law clerk for her decision to dismiss a related criminal case without prejudice. Van Velzer reportedly said that the case should have been dismissed with prejudice if the presiding judge would have been the one who decided in the case. Instead, the case was dismissed without prejudice because the law clerk, who is not a member of the Nevada Bar Association, wrote the decision for the judge. “Can you imagine this kid – fresh out of law school – some 25 years old – deciding my fate by not applying 9th Circuit precedent thereby destroying my case and my future,” Van Velzer was quoted as saying.
Van Velzer was sentenced to 97 months in federal prison and ordered to pay restitution of $1.6 million to Bank One of Arizona and $2.7 million to Freddie Mac. Van Velzer will be placed on supervised release for a period of three years following release from prison.
