Wells Fargo has agreed to pay the Government $1.2 billion for deceiving Uncle Sam into insuring thousands of risky mortgages. It admitted that from 2002-2010, it failed to file timely reports on several thousand loans which had material defects or were badly underwritten. Wells Fargo received substantial profits from its FHA loan business.
No one has been criminally charged in the probes and the Department of Justice has reserved the right to pursue criminal charges if it decides to do so.
Other lenders including Bank of America, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank and JPMorgan previously paid substantial settlements of federal lawsuits against them.
Jeffrey Newman represents whistleblowers.
