Utah title agent Ryan Kelley Goodrich, who did business as Synergy Title Insurance Agency LLC in Salt Lake County, was charged with 14 counts of communications fraud, six counts of unlawful dealing of property by a fiduciary, and one count of unlawful activity, for his involvement in a wide-ranging scheme to defraud property buyers, sellers, and lenders.
According to court documents, an investigation was conducted by the investigations division of the Utah Attorney General’s Office after the office received numerous complaints from parties to local real estate transactions. The investigation revealed a wide-ranging scheme in which Goodrich “repeatedly and knowingly placed a substantial risk of loss of property or funds that had been entrusted to him as a fiduciary in his capacity as a title agent.”
Court documents state that Goodrich closed several real estate transactions where he failed to disburse funds according to the settlement statements provided at closing, including failing to pay off the seller’s existing mortgage and failing to disburse at least one buyer’s earnest money to the seller as had been agreed to by the parties.
“On other occasions, the defendant defrauded sellers whose houses he purported to buy,” court documents state. “For example, on at least one occasion defendant used a false deed purporting to convey seller’s house to himself without tendering purchase funds to the sellers and without closing on the transaction. He then used the fraudulent deed to encumber the seller’s house’s title with a loan to himself for several hundred thousand dollars. Defendant closed on purchases as a buyer on other occasions without tendering purchase funds to the seller. These funds were due either as cash equity to which the seller was entitled or as disbursements to the seller’s mortgage lender to pay off the seller’s existing mortgage.”
Court documents also revealed that Goodrich faces at least three other felony financial crimes cases. The conduct giving rise to those charges arose after the current case was investigated.