Six years after she was acquitted of charges of selling property belonging to other people, a DeBary woman was again arrested on Tuesday accused of forging documents to fraudulently rent or transfer properties in foreclosure to people for money, Volusia County sheriff's investigators said.
Back in 2011, Cindy Fontanez faced 20 years in prison on two counts of grand theft for a real-estate transaction in 2007 but a jury acquitted her.
Sheriff's investigators said Fontanez continued to commit fraud and charged her on Tuesday with organized scheme to defraud more than $50,000. She was being held Wednesday on $25,000 bail, jail records show.
Volusia County Sheriff's Office detectives said that Fontanez, 57, represented herself as the owner of a Cardinal Boulevard house in Port Orange and rented it out to Mayra Concepcion in August 2017, collecting a security deposit of $575 along with the first month's rent of $925.
Almost a month after she moved into the Port Orange Home, Concepcion was served a certified foreclosure paperwork from the bank that held the mortgage for the home, investigators said.
And on Dec. 31, Fontanez evicted Concepcion from the Port Orange home describing Concepcion as an unknown or unwanted tenant, detectives said.
Sheriff's detectives later learned that Fontanez had also duped the owner of the Port Orange home into signing over the property to her. Fontanez told the Port Orange homeowner, who was having financial difficulties, that she would pay the homeowner's outstanding payments and liens and that the resident would get 20 percent of the profit when Fontanez sold the home, investigators said.
Fontanez did not do any of the things she promised and instead rented out the home to Concepcion and let it go into foreclosure, sheriff's detectives said.
The Port Orange case is not the only one where Fontanez has defrauded people of their money in the last year, investigators said.
In April 2017, Fontanez fraudulently registered a forged deed of a property on Annapolis Drive in Deltona at the DeLand courthouse. The owner of the home had died and Fontanez used a fake deed to transfer the property to a Lisbeth Cintron, court records show.
Fontanez forged a notary public's signature on the deed paperwork, investigators said.
Cintron used to be the deceased Ralph Brogdon's tenant but moved out of the house after her landlord died, investigators said.
Fontanez later informed Cintron's husband that she could get them Brogdon's home. Fontanez told Cintron her name was on the deed.
Detectives said they were familiar with foreclosure proceedings and knew the bank sends out foreclosure notices to anyone connected to the property, including tenants, reports state.
That's what Fontanez forged to transfer Brogdon's property to Cintron, telling her she would get the house for Cintron for $1,000, detectives said.
Fontanez also forged documents to have a homeowner transfer to her a home on Chastain Avenue in Deltona, promising the homeowner she would sell the house and get him 20 percent of the profit but the homeowner never heard back from Fontanez. She acted as the landlord for the Chastain Avenue home, investigators said.
Then, on July 5, 2017, detectives learned of another forged deed registered at the courthouse. The deed was for a property at Walkertown Avenue in Deltona.
Fontanez charged Santiago and Angelica Santana $2,000 to file the fake papers, detectives said.
The Santanas had just moved to Deltona from Puerto Rico and believed Fontanez was really helping them, so much so that Santiago Santana quit his job in Puerto Rico and moved to the Deltona home, investigators said.
When Santiago Santana arrived in Deltona, he was served with a lawsuit from the mortgage bank that owned the house Fontana had sold them. He reported that he had not been able to get in touch with Fontanez, reports state.