On October 22, Dana Quinn Roush, former president of American Postal Workers Union Local 403, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina to one count of embezzlement of funds in the sum of $10,089 from the Spartanburg-based union. She had been charged on September 12 following a probe by the U.S. Labor Department’s Office of Labor-Management Standards.
This may be the least of her problems. On September 19, a woman named Dana Q. Roush, a resident of nearby Greenville, S.C., was found guilty in federal court of mail fraud conspiracy in connection with a rent-to-own residential real estate scam involving about 130 properties that she ran with husband Michael Roush. The husband had pleaded guilty prior to trial. The couple’s firm, Kingdom Connected Investments (KCI) LLC, promised a “win-win” outcome for distressed homeowners and aspiring homebuyers. KCI, marketed as a “Christian” organization, would buy a home, obtain title, and find a renter to move in, presumably freeing the seller from further mortgage obligations. Rental payments would count as equity toward purchase. The arrangement seemed ingenious. But what KCI didn’t reveal is that the seller remained legally responsible for the mortgage. The Roushes eventually collected $2.6 million from the sellers but forwarded only $1.4 million to the lenders, pocketing the excess $1.2 million. Many unsuspecting sellers lost their homes through foreclosure, while unsuspecting tenants were left with no possibility of ownership. That’s some win-win!
A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of South Carolina told NLPC that her office was unable to verify if the Dana Q. Roush indicated in charging documents in this equity-skimming scam was the Dana Quinn Roush who ripped off APWU Local 403. The possibility that they are different persons, however, is highly remote. A web search turned up only one person in the entire U.S. with either name. And each happened to live in Greenville, South Carolina.