Scammer Steals $100K In Mortgage Payments From East New York Homeowner, Prosecutors Say

EAST NEW YORK, BROOKLYN — A scam artist has been charged with stealing $100,000 from a woman who hired him to save her home from foreclosure, prosecutors said.

Ravin Lakhram, 45, repeatedly pocketed payments his 56-year-old victim believed she was making on a newly refinanced mortgage over the course of five years, according to the Brooklyn District Attorney’s office.

The victim first contacted Lakhram in 2010, when she became afraid of losing her two-family home on New Jersey Avenue, prosecutors said.

The homeowner hired Lakhram to refinance her mortgage when he promised he could decrease her $2,600 monthly mortgage payments to $1,567 a month, said prosecutors.

But instead of processing the payments, Lakram pocketed almost $100,000 in his victim's monthly payments, which she sent him every month between June, 2010, and December, 2015, said prosecutors.

Prosecutors discovered the alleged scam in 2016 when the woman's home went into foreclosure; she hired an attorney who contacted the District Attorney’s office.

Lakhram, of Queens, was charged with grand larceny in Brooklyn criminal court on Tuesday and held on a $100,000 cash bail, said prosecutors. He faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted.

Contact information for Lakhram’s attorney was not immediately available.

Photo courtesy of Shutterstock