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Mortgage Fraud

Crestwood Developer Gets More Federal Prison Time than Doug Hartmann for Lesser Offense

by Michael R. Allen

Per the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

The owner of a Crestwood development company was sentenced to 37 months in federal prison Friday for a mortgage fraud that cost lenders hundreds of thousands of dollars and sent 16 homes into foreclosure.

That developer, Joseph A. Baumeister, faces 13 more months in prison than Doug Hartmann, for a lesser crime(see “Doug Hartmann Gets Two Years, Life of Shame”, August 11). Also, the developer will pay $364,504 in restitution, an amount more realistic and more likely to be repaid than the $34 million judged against Hartmann. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeff Jensen deserves recognition for meting out a stricter sentence for Baumeister than his boss, Acting United States Attorney Michael W. Reap, did against Hartmann.