Newton football coach indicted for wire fraud

A Newton football coach has been indicted for seven counts of wire fraud, the loss which totals approximately $632,000, U.S. District Court documents say.

Ryan J. Arguello, of Newton, allegedly marketed himself as a real estate investor and established the entity RC Homes in 2014, where he purportedly bought properties at a discount, fixed them up and tried to sell them for a profit, the indictment from the Southern District of Iowa says.

To fund his real estate deals, Arguello took loans from private lenders. In return, Arguello provided mortgages for properties that he owned or claimed to own as collateral for the loans. Arguello provided the lenders their mortgage documents, saying they had been filed at the county recorder’s office.

In order to secure the loan, lenders would initiate foreclosure proceedings on the mortgages held as collateral if Arguello defaulted on the loans.

However, the indictment states from about August 2018 to May 2020, Arguello “knowingly devised, intended to devise and participated in a scheme and artifice to defraud lenders,” and by doing so obtain money from lenders “by means of materially false and fraudulent pretenses.”

Court documents also claim Arguello intentionally concealed material facts. For instance, the indictment says Arguello mailed lenders mortgage documents that he said were filed at the recorder’s office, but the district court says that’s not true and claims he faked county recorder filing stamps.

The court also argues Arguello did not own the properties detailed on some of the mortgages he gave to lenders and claims the emails he sent to lenders indicating his ownership of the real estate was not true.

Arguello also allegedly emailed a lender identifying himself as an attorney named Dan Brown and provided the lender with false information related to the mortgage.

When Arguello failed to payback the loans, court documents said the lenders had no recourse because they could not foreclose on a mortgage that was not filed in their name and could not foreclose on a mortgage for property Arguello never owned in the first place.

The following are the seven wire transfers allegedly Arguello received:

Editor’s note: Of these seven wire transfers, five are for one private lender. In total, three private lenders say they have been affected.

• $120,000 on Aug. 13, 2018

• $67,000 on Aug. 22, 2018

• $85,000 on Sept. 5, 2018

• $75,000 on Oct. 22, 2018

• $85,000 on Nov. 29, 2018

• $95,000 on Jan. 24, 2019

• $105,000 on Aug. 27, 2019

Newton Community School District provided the following statement when asked for comment:

“The Newton Community School District is aware of the situation regarding Ryan Arguello. The allegations are not school-related, so further inquiries should be directed to law enforcement. The district takes allegations of criminal activity involving its employees seriously. As always, we will follow all district policies, state laws and legal advice to make certain we are making decisions in the best interest of our students and community.”

Contact Christopher Braunschweig at 641-792-3121 ext. 6560 or cbraunschweig@newtondailynews.com