Jackson Jambalaya

See Evans case page in "Special Coverage" section on right side of page for all Evans case posts.

Updated with new information.

The U.S. Attorney in Jackson charged Charles H. Evans, Jr. and Jon Christopher Evans yesterday with bank fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Acting U.S. Attorney Donald Burkhalter also seeks the civil forfeiture of all assets involved in the alleged commission of these crimes. The penalties for bank fraud are a fine of $1 million or less and/or imprisonment of not more than thirty years. The Criminal Information alleges 30 banks with offices in Mississippi, 16 banks in Texas, and several other banks and trusts in other states.

The Information charges Charles Evans was "an approved attorney for Mississippi Valley Title, authorized to provide title opinions and prepare certificates for title for MVT, which MVT used and relied upon in order to issue title insurance polices.." The government charges Chris Evans is the registered agent for the companies used to perpetuate the alleged criminal acts.

The Bill of Information alleges the Evans brothers initiated their scheme in January 2003 until October 2009 in Madison County and later Desoto County, the Mississippi Gulf Coast, and Texas "in order to pay down debt held by their company Gulf States Publishing and to enrich themselves, Charles and Chris Evans devised a plan to fraudulently secure mortgage proceeds from financial institutions by misrepresenting to such financial institutions the legal descriptions, title and lien history, and ownership of real estate the Defendants intended to purchase. "

JJ reviewed numerous deeds of trust and estimated the exposure by banks was nearly $75 million ($37 million in Madison, approximately $10 million in Desoto, approximately $27 million in Texas. Most of the Texas banks have been able to foreclose on the properties as the multiple loans were not issued on Texas properties as they were in Mississippi.). The government claims the brothers used the proceeds of the loans to buy more land, make mortgage payments on the outstanding loans, and enrich themselves.

The brothers would buy a large tract of land in the name of one LLC. The brothers would "fictitiously subdivide" the land before they even bought it. After closing, they would obtain large mortgage loans (average loan size was $620,000 in Mississippi, over $1 million in Texas) on smaller portions of the tract purchased through other LLC's they owned. Unfortunately for the banks, no smaller tracts existed and the LLC owning the parent tract never transferred ownership to the LLC claiming ownership of the smaller tract despite the fact Charles Evans provided title certificates showing the LLC did indeed own the land in reality it did not own. The banks were in effect making unsecured loans and in reality, the Evans brothers were perpetuating a ponzi scheme using banks instead of investors.

The government also claims the Evans Brothers ran out of "suitable properties" to purchase and began stacking (my word) new mortgages on top of the older ones on the same land. Mississippi Valley Title testified in an October 2009 Chancery Court hearing the scheme was discovered when bank examiners asked Holmes County Bank to see the deeds on two loans as part of its examination. The bank called the MVT for a copy. MVT had no copies of the deeds and the bank could not find one at the courthouse. Holmes County Bank notified the title insurance company about the missing deeds. MVT attempted to contact Mr. Evans, who would not return calls or appear at his office. MVT investigated and discovered fraud took place.

This is the only information available from the government at this time. The filings yesterday are probably the reason why the government postponed the December trial date of Charles Evans to March. A Praecipe for Summons has been filed for hearing on December 21 at 2:30 PM and states an indictment has been filed.