Title Agent Gets Pinched For Allegedly Converting Real Estate Escrow Cash Into Play Money For Her Own Personal Pleasure
In West Palm Beach, Florida, The Palm Beach Post reports:
- A Wellington title agent faces up to 30 years in prison and $5 million in fines from federal charges filed last week that allege she diverted money from closings to gamble and pay personal expenses. Dawn Herndon, who ran Accurate Title Closings, LLC., was charged Wednesday with five counts of fraud on a financial institution. The complaint says the 46-year-old obtained more than $3.3 million of mortgage monies by falsyfing HUD-1 settlement statements in 32 separate sale closings that occurred between December 2009 and December 2010. Herndon could not be reached Monday, and no defense attorney was listed in federal court documents. A bond recommendation of $100,000 was filed with the complaint. “Contrary to the representations made on the HUD-1s, Dawn Herndon transferred most of the mortgage proceeds from the Accurate Title Closings escrow accounts to the business operating accounts and then used these monies for her personal benefit, that is, to gamble and pay personal and business expenses,” according to the complaint. The five felony charges stem from closings Herndon allegedly conducted on homes in Wellington, Lake Worth, West Palm Beach and Boynton Beach. Florida’s Office of the Chief Financial Officer issued an administrative complaint against Herndon in January alleging she wrote checks on Accurate’s escrow account that bounced, failed to pay $4,882 to the Miami-Dade Tax Collector and failed to maintain the company’s surety bond.
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