Let's do some simple math.

Anyone remember the Miami Herald article from back in October 7, 2008 regarding the Bernardo Barrera mortgage fraud arrests? Like I've said time and time again, something just didn't seem right about that article and the way it was written. Today, let's look at the numbers Mr. Ovalle quoted:

"From Estefano's escrow account, $369,896.88 was paid to Romney, and $135,000 was kicked back to Martinez's bank account."

That's pretty clear isn't it? Anyone who read that quote that Mr. Ovalle had written would conclude that their was $369,896.88 paid out to Mr. Romney from the attorneys escrow account and an additional $135,000 paid out to Mr. Martinez from the attorneys escrow account. That would make a total of $504,896.88 paid out from the attorneys escrow account, pretty easy to follow. Let's take a look at the closing statement for the purchase of the Oak Avenue home (which by the way is available for all to see at the court house) and see if we can make the numbers work. According to the closing statement, Mr. Romney borrowed the money for the initial purchase of the Oak Avenue home, it's reflected here:

Ok, that's fairly normal, so let's add that to the numbers we mentioned above. Let's see, we had the following (according to Mr. Ovalle and the Miami Herald):

• $369,896.88 Paid to John Romney from attorneys escrow account
• $135,000.00 Paid to Michael Martinez from attorneys escrow account
• $194,450.98 Payoff of first mortgage loan

That makes a total of $699,347.86 which does not include closing costs! Does anyone see the problem here? Let's go back to that closing statement for a moment:


That's right folks! The sales price of the home was only $600,000.00! Even if you disregard the other costs associated with the closing, according to the Herald there's nearly an extra $100k in there! WTF? That don't make no sense! So where did this error come from? We know that Mr. Ovalle screwed up when he wrote his article and we already know that Mr. Ovalle didn't do any research on the story when he wrote it. More than likely Mr. Ovalle was given a press release which he copied verbatim for his article (remember that word VERBATIM Jorge?). This makes you wonder, who wrote that press release? Did that press release come from the MDPD? Or did the press release come from assistant state attorney Bill Kostrzewski who worked on the case? Regardless, as with just about every other aspect of this story, SOMEONE FCUKED UP.