Ann Arbor Real Estate Attorney

Indian American lawyer to plead guilty to $2 mn fraud – Yahoo! India News

Washington, Oct 3 (IANS) An Indian-American lawyer has agreed to plead guilty to two felony charges relating to a scheme where he took more than $2 million awarded in a class action suit and lost it all on the stock market.

A criminal information filed in the US District Court in Los Angeles charges Sandeep Baweja, 39, with one count of wire fraud and one count of obstruction of justice, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) said Friday.

Prosecutors filed a plea agreement in which Baweja agreed to plead guilty to the two charges which carry a statutory maximum penalty of 30 years in federal prison. Baweja was the sole proprietor of Baweja Law Group (BLG), which was based in Los Angeles until August 2008 when BLG relocated to Irvine.

According to court documents, Baweja filed a class action on behalf of current and former real estate agents of ZipRealty, Inc. in May 2007. The complaint alleged that ZipRealty denied class members certain sales commissions, refused to reimburse business expenses, and made unlawful wage deductions.

In the fall of 2007, Baweja reached a settlement with ZipRealty in which the company agreed to pay $3.55 million to compensate class members and to pay for attorney's fees and other costs.

On March 10, 2008, United States District Judge S. James Otero finalised the judgment in the case, which prompted ZipRealty to pay the $3.55 million settlement, a quarter of which went to attorney's fees for Baweja and his co-counsel.

Baweja's share of the attorney's fees was $660,000. The balance of the settlement – approximately $2,525,000 – was to be paid to approximately 800 class member claimants on a pro rata basis.

After the settlement money was deposited into a bank account that Baweja controlled on behalf of the class, Baweja set up his own online stock brokerage account and began transferring most of the settlement proceeds into that trading account.

Although he had no experience as a trader in the stock market, Baweja used the misappropriated funds to day trade securities on margin. By December 2008, the value of Baweja's stock account had shrunk to approximately $55,000, meaning that Baweja had lost virtually all of the settlement money that he had held in trust for his clients.

Arun Kumar

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16 Tips to Buy Real Estate Successfully
 by: D. S. Peter

1. Do not overanalyze. You may lose a lot of great opportunities to make great deal of money. Start making offers!

2. Get the property under a contract first with a safety clause.

3. Ask fellow investors, real estate broker about the property value. If it makes sense go ahead with the purchase.

4. If you are buying for a quick flip neighborhoods do not matter. What matters is the $$$ you are going to make.

5. Your perfect buy should be a house/condo/building in excellent condition and in a good neighborhood.

6. Your Second choice should be a cosmetic fixer in a good neighborhood.

7. Inspect the property. Try to get as many things fixed by the seller as possible. Check the neighborhood. Drive around the block. Look at the houses in the neighborhood, what is their condition. Look at the cars parked in the street. Old cars normally can tell you a lot about the neighborhood. Trash on the sidewalks can spell less than great neighborhood. Which in turns means you should buy and sell quickly (most of the time). Renting in those neighborhood could be challenging, especially for the new investor.

8. Use a real estate agent or broker. My first great deal was found by a broker. Try to get access to the MLS so you can look for deals yourself.

9. Shop around for Financing. My experiences with the loan officers tells me one thing. Email them your questions and ask them to email you back their answers or put them on paper. They tend to always change terms and rates (though illegal), and put junk charges.

10. Try to reduce your Title/Escrow charges review them with an experienced investor or real estate agent.

11. Use a real estate attorney for your foreclosure/pre-foreclosure purchases.

12. You can check these free Real Estate Investing Educational sites:

http://www.realestate-investinginfo.com and

http://www.buying-investment-property.info. Read as much as you can from them.

13. Make connections with other fellow real estate investors. You can learn great deal first hand experience from them. One peace of advice alone could be worth thousands for you. So if you like challenges and lifetime learning Real Estate Investing is a great field to work and have fun.

14. Advertise yourself. Get business cards hand them to interested people. Place ads in the newspaper and use whatever other means of advertising you can think of.

15. Use the right Real Estate Forms when you buy and sell. If you don’t have any forms here is a website you can print forms for free:

http://www.realestate-agentsinfo.com/

16. Do not be afraid to buy real estate. Fear and lack of knowledge are the number one factor for failure.

This article can be published by anyone as long as the reference box remains intact and all links are kept live.

About The Author

Copyright © D. S. Peter is a successful real estate investor for over 14 years.

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