Iowa man forced to cash in cryptocurrency in real estate scam case

A tip from a Watchdog reader has helped Iowa Legal Aid recover more than $ 180,000 for a couple who a court found a Des Moines real estate scammer had scammed their home.

The insider told Watchdog that Danial Howe, who said he left the country after Muniba and Hasan Toric sued him in June 2020, was promoting himself online as a cryptocurrency expert.

After Watchdog asked Iowa Legal Aid, which had represented the Torics in court, the nonprofit agency was able to confirm the lead. He requested Howe's bank accounts and financial records and learned that he was making a lot of money investing in cryptocurrencies.

Using a provision of Iowa law dating back to long before the Bitcoin era, he was able to force Howe this month to charge his cryptocurrency to pay for the Torics.

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“It's definitely a feel-good story. Our clients were in dire straits, and they had really been surviving, ”said Alex Kornya, litigation director for Iowa Legal Aid.

Kornya said the case could be useful to other attorneys in Iowa seeking payment of court judgments.

How the 1945 case forced a scammer to collect cryptocurrencies

The Iowa law that provides for the collection of judgments is dated and did not take into account new types of assets such as cryptocurrencies. But Iowa Legal Aid used a case from 1945 to argue that it should be able to collect from defendants who defrauded others but hid their assets in a new form of property. In that case, the alternative asset was war bonds, he said.

"We had to think of something, and it worked," he said. "The court allowed him to sell the cryptocurrency and he did."

How The Scammer Tricked A Couple Out Of Their Des Moines Home

A Watchdog investigation in September 2020 recounted how Howe had offered to rescue the Torics from foreclosure. after they suffered financial difficulties caused by health problems.

Howe, a custom motorcycle and parts business owner who had racked up 20 consumer complaints to the Iowa Attorney General's Office, was shifting his career at the time to real estate.

In videos, he called himself dean of "Power Profits University" and presented his deal making skills to potential subscribers on YouTube. A self-described veteran of remodeling homes and buying foreclosed properties said he had no trouble finding people who would be willing to hand over the keys to their homes if he could help them get out of deep debt.

What Howe actually did, Iowa Legal Aid attorneys successfully argued in court, was trick the Torics into signing the deed to their home and then take away the equity they still had.

The Bosnian couple were among at least 14 homeowners in Des Moines, West Des Moines, Urbandale and Altoona who assigned their deeds to Howe in 2017 and 2018, according to court documents filed by Iowa Legal Aid. And the Torics had been unfortunate enough to lose their first home during the Bosnian War.

Attorneys at Iowa Legal Aid became involved with the Torics after Howe attempted to evict them from their 15-year-old home in early 2018.

Through an interpreter, Muniba Toric told Watchdog in 2020 that the experience was so stressful that she was hospitalized and ended up in a coma for 15 days.

"I was in the hospital for four months," he said. “When I woke up, I couldn't walk on my own feet. And to this day, I still can't walk properly. "

Previously:He took the equity in his home. Now, time is running out for a Des Moines couple who fought to get it back.

Later that year, a judge ruled that Howe had "willfully and senselessly" violated a portion of the Iowa code intended to protect homeowners in foreclosure against fraud, misrepresentation and false promises.

But Howe never appeared in court. Lawyers said he disappeared before the judge imposed damages against him.

The Tourics were forced to sell their house. Securing the January trial will help them rebound financially.

“The total payment was just over $ 180,000. Now they can buy a new house, ”Kornya said.

Lee Rood's Reader's Watchdog column helps Iowans get answers and accountability from public officials, the justice system, businesses, and nonprofits. get to her in lrood@registermedia.com, at 515-284-8549, on Twitter at @leerood or on Facebook at Facebook.com/readerswatchdog.

Iowa man forced to cash in cryptocurrency in real estate scam case

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