Fraud Investigation FBI Arrests Man Accused of Yearslong Timeshare Scam

A 56-year-old Williamsburg man is facing 24 fraud-related charges after being accused of using stolen identities to scam resort companies out of thousands of dollars.

A federal indictment against Keith D. Kosco shows he owned or operated several timeshare or travel businesses between 2005 and 2013, operating many of them out of an office building at 335 McLaws Circle in James City County.

Kosco and co-defendant Julie L. Duffield, a Montana resident who owned and operated Professional Closing Company from 2007 to 2013, were arrested on warrants for mail fraud, wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, forfeiture and conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud by the FBI on Nov. 20, court records show.

http://liarcatchers.com/fraud_investigation.html

The two were working under two businesses: Elite Equity Transfers, which charged resort companies an advance fee and transferred ownership of timeshare units to a new owner, and Resort Solutions Inc., which provided advertising and marketing services for people looking to sell or rent their timeshare units.

Kosco allegedly bundled the two services and offered them to resort companies. If a customer who already owned a timeshare unit wanted to purchase a new timeshare unit from a resort company, the customer could pay Kosco to either trade in his or her existing timeshare unit as part of the purchase or advertise the existing unit for sale or rent.

Beginning in 2009, Kosco and his employees are alleged to have used stolen identities and straw owners — representatives for owners who do not want to reveal their identities — to receive the transferred timeshares from resort companies while charging the resort companies for the service.

Kosco and his employees fabricated deeds, contracts, bank accounts, email accounts, tax returns and post office boxes under the stolen names and forged signatures, the indictment states.

In all, Kosco is suspected of transferring more than 1,000 timeshare units to stolen identities, resulting in about $822,914 in losses to various resort companies.

Resort companies began declining Kosco’s attempts to transfer timeshare units in 2012 when they realized maintenance fees were not being paid by the new owners of the timeshare units, court documents state.

The indictment maintains Kosco began using his daughter’s identity in September 2013 to transfer timeshare units. His daughter was incarcerated in Rockingham County at the time and was unaware her father was using her identity to transfer timeshare units, the indictment said.

Kosco was arrested Dec. 6 when he arrived in Miami, Fl. from Mexico, authorities said.

He was granted a $100,000 secured bond in Newport News at the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia and will have a trial in February, a spokesperson with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia said.

Court records show Duffield waived her right to a detention hearing Nov. 24.

Calls to Resort Solutions Inc. and Elite Equity Transfers were not answered Thursday. James City County Commissioner of the Revenue Richard Bradshaw told WYDaily on Thursday that Resort Solutions Inc. has an active business license.

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