Real Estate Investor Agrees To Pay $47K+ To Settle Civil Charges Of Foreclosure Auction Bid Rigging Brought By NC AG

From the Office of the North Carolina Attorney General:

• A Virginia man and his company are barred from rigging bids on public auctions and must pay civil penalties and consumer refunds for trying to fix foreclosure sales of properties in Durham and Mecklenburg counties, Attorney General Roy Cooper announced [].

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• The Attorney General alleges that Bruce Olvin McBarnette of Sterling, Virginia and his company, Summit Connection LLC, entered into agreements to rig bids on four foreclosed properties being auctioned in Durham County in 2009 and 2010:
  
  McBarnette told a local pastor that he would continue bidding against her for property her church wanted to purchase unless she paid him $1,200.
  
  A man trying to purchase a home for his mother paid McBarnette $800 after McBarnette told him he would lose the auction unless he paid the money.
  
  A pastor who wanted to help revitalize his church’s neighborhood paid McBarnette a total of $2,900 so that his company wouldn’t keep bidding on two properties.

• In seven other property auctions, Cooper contends that McBarnette attempted to get competing bidders to pay him not to bid against them but the bidders turned him down. Four of those auctions involved Durham County properties, and three involved Mecklenburg County properties.

• Wake County Superior Court Judge Donald Stephens [] approved Cooper’s request for a consent judgment against McBarnette and Summit Connection. Under the judgment, McBarnette and Summit Connection must pay $47,400.(1)

For the NC AG press release, see Attorney General stops scheme to rig bids on foreclosure auctions (Company sought to illegally manipulate sales of Durham, Mecklenburg properties).

(1) This guy appears to have gotten off pretty easy. Compare this case with another North Carolina case where the Feds brought criminal charges against a foreclosure auction bid rigging racket, as reported in a recent U.S. Department of Justice press release: North Carolina Real Estate Speculator Pleads Guilty to Bid Rigging in Real Estate Foreclosure Auctions ("Anyone with information concerning bid rigging or fraud related to real estate foreclosure auctions should contact the Antitrust Division’s Atlanta Field Office at 404-331-7100 or visit www.justice.gov/atr/contact/newcase.htm").

Go here for other posts & links on bid rigging at foreclosure and tax sale auctions.