A Vincentian is facing up to 30 years in prison, heavy fines, and restitution after pleading guilty for his role in a multimillion-dollar scam in New York.{{more}}

Maurice McDowall, who once resided in Cane Garden, was brought before a Manhattan Federal Court for defrauding banks and fleecing foreclosure victims in Brooklyn and the Bronx.

According to the Brooklyn Daily News, on Wednesday, June 4, 2008, McDowall and Alexsander Lipkin, a mortgage broker who coordinated the fraudulent loans, pleaded guilty in the Federal Court to one count of conspiracy to commit bank and wire fraud in a scheme that stole dozens of homes and racked up more than US$20 million in home mortgages and equity loans.

The Vincentian, who, according to the Brooklyn Daily News, directed the daily operations of the scheme, was indicted with Alexsander, Andrea Moore, Marina Dubin, Kerri Clarke and Michael Irving with participating in the wide-ranging scheme, in which they defrauded homeowners of the titles to their homes and caused lenders to hold millions of dollars of bad loans.

After several months on the run, McDowall was arrested in Puerto Rico on December 1, 2007.

From November 2003 through April 2005, the defendants engaged in the fraud scheme targeting homeowners whose homes, primarily in Brooklyn and Bronx, were in foreclosure or facing foreclosure, by offering them a plan to “save” their homes.