US: California man convicted of foreclosure bid-riging

A federal jury convicted Thomas Joyce for his role in a conspiracy to rig bids at public real estate foreclosure auctions held in Contra Costa County, California, the Department of Justice announced today.

After a week-long trial before honorable Chief Judge Phyllis J. Hamilton in Oakland, California, the jury convicted Joyce of one count of conspiring to rig bids at foreclosure auctions between about June 2008 and January 2011. Joyce was charged in an indictment returned by a federal grand jury in the Northern District of California on Dec. 3, 2014.

The evidence at trial showed that Joyce conspired with others to rig bids to obtain properties sold at foreclosure auctions in Contra Costa County. The conspirators negotiated payoffs for agreeing not to compete and then held second, private auctions known as “rounds” to determine the amounts of the payoffs for the individuals who had participated in the bid suppression.

Including Joyce’s conviction, 64 individuals have either pleaded guilty or been convicted after trial of criminal charges as a result of the department’s ongoing antitrust investigations into bid rigging at public foreclosure auctions in Northern California. Indictments are pending against several other real estate investors who participated in the conspiracy.

Full Content: Law 360

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