Let's take a look at Mortgage Fraud Task Force case # F07-34446 A-D, the story of MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER and David Rodriguez Esq.

Today's post is going to be a bit long in the tooth, so please bear with me, its worth it! For those readers among us that are in the MDPD or in the legal profession, pay particular attention to this post, its full of interesting tidbits that are rather alarming. As I mentioned yesterday, I've contacted attorney David Rodriguez on three separate occasions via email to see if he wanted to tell us anything about this story before we posted our findings. I still haven't heard from him, so we'll go ahead and see what we can deduce from the arrest affidavit for case # F07-34446 A-D. Early on during our research in this case I came across a problem when I was digging through the county clerks website, I was able to find F07-34446-A, and F07-34446-C but was unable to find F07-34446-B or F07-34446-D. Now, I knew the B and D cases existed, I just couldn't find them. I went back and watched the Mortgage Fraud Task Force's press release and counted four defendants, they are as follows:

1. Nestor Camacho
2. Jose Delgado
3. David Rodriguez
4. Monica Zuluaga

With four defendants, why was I only able to find two with F07-34446 case number? I then searched again and was able to find the following:

1. Nestor Camacho F07-34446-A
2. Jose Delgado F07-34447
3. Monica Zuluaga F07-34446-C

Mr. Delgado's case disposition says "transferred to another case", yet for reasons I can't understand, I can't find the other case. Please be patient with me, as I've explained several times in the past, I have a very limited knowledge of how the criminal court system works therefore I could have erred in some way, shape or form in researching Mr. Delgado's history. Please don't draw any conclusions based on my unsuccessful attempt at figuring out what happened to Mr. Delgado.

That left me with one name that I couldn't figure out, David Rodriguez. His name was in the press release, yet for some reason or another I couldn't find anything on him on the clerks website. Bizarre and all the more reason for me to go down to the court house and look at the file myself. Here's a hint of what I found...


WTF is that black magic marker doing over that name damn it! That really pissed me off! I pour over the arrest affidavit and guys, WHAT A CASE! Sargeant Richard Davis of the Miami Dade County Mortgage Fraud Task Force did a hell of a job on this one! Sgt. Davis posed undercover as the sellers accountant and dealt directly with all the players in the fraud including the attorney! Lets take a look at the affidavit as it appeared in the case file. I'm going to post the affidavit page by page (with a little commentary at the end of each page), if you want to get a better look at the page, just click and the page will enlarge.

Page 1

Here we find that Mr. Camacho was purchasing a condo from a retired police officer, the sales price was going to be $250,000 but they were inflating the sales price by $100,000. When the sellers attorney objected to the extra $100,000 MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER told the sellers attorney that if the HUD-1 reflected the $100,000 going back to the buyer, the lender wouldn't approve the loan. Sgt Davis in his under cover role as the sellers accountant was told that MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER's office was going to prepare phony documents that showed that the extra $100,000 was being given back to the buyer for renovations. Very nice.

Page 2

In page 2 Sgt. Davis tells us how WMC Mortgage wired the proceeds of the loan into MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER's trust account before the closing took place and then MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER paid off the sellers mortgage before the closing ever took place, without the seller signing a single document. We're then told that David Rodriguez's Office never advised the lender of the addendum that was prepared for the seller to return the $100,000 to the buyer at the closing. WAIT A MINUTE! WHAT THE FCUK? David Rodriguez? Was he MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER? Did a clerk forget to cross his name out? WHY WAS HIS NAME CROSSED OUT IN THE FIRST PLACE?

Page 3

Page three discusses different aspect of the fraudulent loan application and indicates that the sellers attorney contacted MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER and asked him why the $100,000 his clients were to give the buyer at closing wasn't on the HUD-1 at which point MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER tells him that if the $100,000 was on the HUD-1, the lender would not approve the transaction. Monica Zuluaga goes on to tell the sellers attorney the same on behalf of MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER's office.

Page 4

Here the sellers attorney calls MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER and asks again about the excess $100,000 that his client was to pay the buyer at the closing, when asked why this wasn't reflected on the HUD-1 MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER tells him once again that if the refund was reflected on the HUD-1, THE LENDER WOULD NOT CLOSE THE LOAN. Sgt. Davis being the bad ass that he his posing as the sellers accountant then goes on to negotiate a $20,900 credit for the sellers so they could cover any potential income tax problems from what would look like a $100,000 profit from the sale of their home! Sgt. Davis is then assured that MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER's office will take care of all the documentation to cover the excess proceeds from the transaction. Once again their is a mention of David Rodriguez's office, is this Mr. Rodriguez and MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER one and the same? We'll see.

Page 5

Here Sgt. Davis uncovers the fact that MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER had paid off the sellers mortgage with the proceeds of the loan the buyer had obtained without the closing ever happening! Sgt. Davis then goes on January 10, 2007 nearly three weeks after the sellers loan was paid off posing as the sellers accountant to ask about the potential tax consequences of the $100,000 in excess proceeds. Once again there is mention of the Law Office of David Rodriguez, this time with an address. Again, we ask ourselves, is David Rodriguez and MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER one and the same?

Page 6

MY GOD! Sgt. Davis now lets MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER and Monica Zuluaga in Mr. Rodriguez's office know that he is a COP and that he's going to be seizing the file with all the fraud in it! HOLY $HIT! NICE WORK SGT. DAVIS! Can you imagine the look on MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER and Zuluaga's faces! I wonder if Mr. Rodriguez was in office at the time when this went down?! WOW!

Page 7

WOW! On page seven we find out that in the closing file there were two deposit checks from the buyer, one for $5,000 and one for $10,000 made out to MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER's trust account, both of which were returned as NSF! Even though both down payment checks made out to MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER's trust account were returned, MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER nor anyone else ever alerted the sellers to this issue. Sgt. Davis then debriefs Mr. Delgado the mortgage broker who goes on to admit that he prepared all the fraudulent loan paperwork.

Page 8

On Page 8, Mr. Delgado goes on to state the MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER and Monica Zuluaga were aware of the fraud and had helped conceal it from the lender! In addition to spelling out how he helped perpetrate this fraud, he goes on to say that he told the buyer not to worry about the NSF checks written to MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER's trust account and that not to worry, that MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER's office "would cover the issue". WOW!

Page 9

Page 9 details more aspects of how the fraudsters put together the crime then Sgt. Davis goes on to speak to Ms. Sharon Mason the legal representative of the lender, once again there's mention of David Rodriguez's office. Interesting. She goes on to mention that the lender had no idea about the $100,000 overage and had been unaware that the loan application and the documents that had been created by the broker and David Rodriguez's office were fraudulent and fabricated. Once again we have to ask ourselves, is David Rodriguez and MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER one and the same?

Page 10

Sgt Davis goes on to explain the fraud to Ms. Mason who then became enraged at the conduct of the mortgage broker and MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER. Not to mention the fact that MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER PAID OFF THE SELLERS LOAN WITHOUT THE CLOSING HAVING HAPPENED USING THE LENDERS MONEY!

I must say, FCUKING BRILLIANT WORK SARGEANT DAVIS! WOW! This man does the citizens of Miami Dade County proud! Sgt. Davis busted not only the fraudulent buyer, the fraudulent mortgage broker, but he gets the closing processor Monica Zuluaga and MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER! But what about the attorney David Rodriguez? Our fearless Mayor told us in the Mortgage Fraud Task Force press release that Mr. Rodriguez was arrested, so why can't I find anything in the clerk's website regarding the arrest? Not to mention WHO THE FCUK IS MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER?! Is David Rodriguez Esq. and MR. BLACK MAGIC MARKER one and the same? Baffling huh? It would be a mystery if not for the funny little camera that I used to take photos of the arrest affidavit. Take a look at how the camera captured this instance of the black magic marker being used to obscure a name...

Draw your own conclusions. Regardless of the fact that someone forgot to cover Mr. Rodriguez's name several times throughout the affidavit, even where they did cover his name, it was clearly visible beneath the black magic marker. There is no misreading this case, after all a great deal of the interaction with the fraudsters was with Sgt. Davis directly while he was posing as the sellers accountant! This is what in my book is called a SLAM FCUKING DUNK CASE! My hats off to the fantastic investigation and under cover work done by Sargeant Davis of the Miami Dade Mortgage Fraud Task Force. Its this kind of brave police work that is woefully under reported in the media, my hats off to you sir. JOB WELL DONE.

How does this explain Mr. Rodriguez's name being deleted (albeit poorly) throughout the case file and from the public record? Its a mystery to me. Now that we've seen how Sgt. Davis flawlessly put this case together, the case now goes to the State Attorney's Office. Once the baton is passed to the State Attorney's Office, its up to the Assistant State Attorney assigned to the case to prosecute the bad guys that the PD brought to justice. Tomorrow we'll see how the SAO handled the task forces fantastic case and we'll see if we can get some clarification as to why David Rodriguez's name was deleted from the record.