Ex-Assembly candidate Alston among 3 arrested on mortgage fraud charges

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The Hudson County Prosecutor’s Office arrested three people, including former District 31 Assembly candidate Bruce Alston and his sister, on Friday for their roles in an alleged mortgage fraud scheme. 

Bruce Alston

By John Heinis/Hudson County View

Bruce Alston, 44, Gail Alston, 50, both of Jersey City, and Maisha K. Taylor, 42, of Newark were charged with making/possessing material to make false government documents, false/tampering with record, theft/illegal retention, tampering with public records, false representation, theft by deception, impersonation and conspiracy to commit all those aforementioned crimes.

The Alstons and Taylor, an ex-girlfriend of Bruce Alston, were all arrested by the Hudson County Prosecutor’s Special Investigations Unit early Friday morning.

Investigators allege that back in September 2011, the three operated under the business entity “Blue Angle” to conspire and secure a mortgage for Oroton Equities, a real estate lending and financing company based out of Brooklyn, New York.

The loan was intended for the property address of 560 Bramhall Ave. in Jersey City in the amount of $133,000, authorities say. Principal members of Oroton Equities claim that no payments were made on the loan so it eventually went into default, officials said.

Additionally, investigations say that several fraudulent documents were provided by cohorts in order to ensure the loan would go through, therefore purposely deceiving Oroton Equities, police said.

All three charged were processed in Jersey City’s Central Judicial Processing court on Friday, where they received a $35,000 bail with a 10 percent option each.

In a blog post yesterday, Bruce Alston, who unsuccessfully made a bid for the District 31 Assembly seat in June, said he anticipated having legal issues in the situation due to a disgruntled former business partner.

“I anticipated and welcome the legal process becoming involved in this matter. In May 2015, my former equity partner began to reach out to political adversaries and other business partners expounding to them that he had information which could be used against me in my Assembly Race campaign,” he wrote.

“He went so far as to try to extort me into an agreement in his favor. I encouraged him to pursue legal action since I would not cave to threats or acts of intimidation.”

Bruce Alston declined to comment further when reached by Hudson County View.

Sources, who spoke under the condition of anonymity since they are not authorized to speak on the matter, said  at least part of the discord between the Alstons & Oroton Equities stems from Oroton recommending a disbarred attorney to represent Blu Angle LLC in an oil contamination suit.

The attorney was allegedly paid legal fees in the civil case, but was sentenced to prison before he actually performed any legal work, according to sources.


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1 COMMENT

  1. Let me guess Bruce, you either didn’t do “nothing” or you “made a mistake”. Why is it when a political nut gets charged with a crime “they made a mistake”. Everybody else is called a criminal.
    Man up, do your year in a halfway house and I’m sure there will be a job waiting for you somewhere.

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