Methuen Broker Spending Three Years in Prison for Role in Bogus Short Sale Scheme

File photograph. (Image licensed by Ingram Image.)

Former Methuen real estate broker Greisy Jimenez is headed to prison for her role in a Merrimack Valley short sale scheme. (File photograph)

A Methuen real estate broker will spend three years in prison followed by four years of supervised release for her role in a Merrimack Valley-area short sale scheme, the Department of Justice said this week.

Fifty-year-old Greisy Jimenez received her sentence Tuesday from U.S. Senior District Court Judge Mark L. Wolf, who also imposed a fine of $12,500. Jimenez’s sentence comes eight months after she pleaded guilty to two counts of bank fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit bank fraud.

Jimenez is the fourth co-conspirator to be sentenced in relation to the three-year scheme, which defrauded banks through bogus short sales of homes in Haverhill, Lawrence and Methuen.

From 2007-2010, Jimenez, along with mortgage loan officer Vanessa Ricci and real estate closing attorneys Jasmin Polanco and Hyacinth Bellarose submitted fraudulent documents related to real estate transactions called short sales, in which property is sold for less than the value of any existing mortgage debt.

The conspirators are said to have deceived banks in an effort to encourage them to permit the short sales, while doing the same to purported buyers’ banks to provide financing for the deals. During the scheme, purported sellers stayed in their homes and saw their debt reduced.

Polanco was sentenced to 15 months in prison, three years of supervised release and a fine of $1.2 million, while Ricci received a six-month prison sentence and three years of supervised release. Ricci was also ordered to pay restitution of $963,000. Bellarose was sentenced to time served and one year of supervised release to be served in home detention.