Popular Local Sports Broadcaster Caught in Mortgage Fraud Scheme

Or something like that.

Channel 2 news (CBS) here in SLC reported last night that their sports reporter Dave Fox had entered a Plea in Abeyance in a mortgage fraud scheme that supposedly had him falsifying documents and statements related to the over-inflation of a home in the hoity-toity-and-at-the-same-time-very-mealy neighborhood called the River Bottoms in the Provo area.

Fox's plea is essentially a guilty plea without admitting guilt. His lawyer paints him as the victim, and the court has agreed to dismiss the charges (Failure To Occupy/Communications Fraud were the official charges - as it is in most mortgage fraud schemes) in return for Fox's testimony against the several other participants.

Fox wasn't on the news broadcast last night. I wonder how long, if ever, it will take for KUTV to put him back on the air.

Court documents help tell the story, which goes far beyond Fox. The documents show that Fox and Atkin intentionally, knowingly or recklessly devised a scheme to defraud another. Court documents show the two men falsified home loan documents to make money on a quick resale. Joe Christensen, director of the State Insurance Fraud Division, said, "This is the first level of a multi-level investment that involves millions of dollars and fraud and more than a dozen people."

Investigators say it's a big case involving at least a dozen people who allegedly conspired to inflate the value of real estate they bought, sold and borrowed money on.

What's even more interesting to me are the comments that accompany the news story as posted over at rival station (and LDS Church-owned) KSL (NBC).

read the story and check the comments

And coming shortly to this spot: a post about "chair porn" and a post on Jaco Pastorius, bass player who changed the face of modern jazz forever, who died 20 years ago last Friday. Sadly.