Six LIers charged in pay-stub factory fraud

A half-dozen people from Long Island ran what prosecutors called “a pay stub factory” to steal nearly $6 million in a mortgage fraud scheme involving 21 properties, the Suffolk district attorney’s office said Thursday.

Prosecutors said the defendants generated fake pay stubs, W-2 income-tax forms and other documents to help straw buyers defraud such lenders as Wells Fargo and Emigrant Mortgage Co.

Four people have been arraigned on an 82-count indictment charging them with grand larceny, forgery, mortgage fraud and possession of a forged instrument.

Two others were to be arraigned Thursday in Suffolk County Court in Riverhead.

Detectives last March raided a Brentwood tax office run by Irma Tocco, 60, of Brentwood, and seized documents related to the scheme, said Robert Clifford, spokesman for District Attorney Thomas Spota.

“They found what they described as a pay-stub factory,” he said.

The scam involved 21 properties, mostly in Brentwood, Central Islip and Amityville, Clifford said.

Tocco posed as a tax preparer to generate documentation for the straw buyers, prosecutors said. She pleaded not guilty Jan. 7 and was held on $10,000 bail.

Victor Jinete, 35, of East Islip, pleaded not guilty Dec. 29; Thomas Rosales, 39, of Mastic Beach, pleaded not guilty Jan. 8; and Connie Salas, also known as Martha Marrero, 46, of Brentwood, pleaded not guilty on Jan. 22.

Jinete, Rosales and Salas were held without bail.

Two other defendants were scheduled for arraignment Thursday. Their cases remained sealed until the arraignment.