Mass. Man Gets 27 Months for Mortgage Fraud

CONCORD, NH – Kurt Sanborn, a 48-year-old former resident of Dracut, MA, has been sentenced to 27 months in prison, announced Acting United States Attorney Donald Feith on Dec. 17, 2015.

In May 2003, Sanborn used a private $500,000 loan to buy a home in Manchester. In exchange, the private lenders received a first mortgage on the Manchester property which was recorded at the Hillsborough County Registry of Deeds.

In October 2003, Sanborn asked a mortgage company for a $685,000 loan to buy a second home in Gilford. The mortgage company agreed to finance the transaction if it received first mortgages on the Manchester and Gilford properties. To deceive the mortgage company, Sanborn caused a mortgage discharge that contained the private lenders’ forged signatures to be filed with the Hillsborough County Registry of Deeds. Sanborn’s conduct involving interstate wire communication and documents that were delivered by the U.S. Postal Service as part of the fraud served as the basis for wire and mail fraud charges.

Sanborn was also charged with bank fraud based on his conduct in February 2004 in acquiring a $150,000 loan from a federally insured bank in exchange for a second mortgage on the Manchester property. Sanborn concealed from the bank the private lenders’ mortgage on the Manchester property.

In October 2004, Sanborn sold the Manchester property without disclosing the private lenders’ mortgage on the property to the new owners. He then used the proceeds of the sale to make a $185,000 payment to the mortgage company and to fully repay the $150,000 loan from the federally insured bank.

Sanborn pleaded guilty to the charges in May 2014.

The case was investigated by the United States Postal Inspection Service. It was prosecuted by AUSA Robert Kinsella.