A husband-and-wife real estate team working with Seattle investors were indicted by a federal grand jury this week after allegedly orchestrating a $2.25 million fraud scheme.
Paul Waln, 58, of Dallas, and his ex-wife Tamara King, aka Tamara Waln, 54, of Toledo, Ohio, are accused of conspiracy, wire fraud, money laundering and falsely claiming losses resulted from a contractor's fabricated cancer diagnosis, according to the Department of Justice (DOJ).
The indictment says between August 2009 and December 2019, Waln solicited investments for a real estate fund called Halcyon. He garnered $2.25 million from 22 people, most of whom were Seattle residents, the DOJ said. Waln told investors the money would be pooled to purchase and renovate an apartment building in West Seattle and then used for other real estate projects, the DOJ added.
Investors were required to leave their money in the pool for 10 years, and at the end of the 10 years, Waln said investors would get their money back plus earnings, which he estimated would be about 20% annually, according to court documents. Waln told investors he would earn a 1% fee for managing the fund, court documents say.
Waln was married in 2013 to King, who was also a real estate agent, and the duo jointly managed the investment fund, according to court documents. The DOJ alleges they conspired to use money from the fund to pay for personal expenses, and they secretly transferred hundreds of thousands of dollars at a time from the fund to their management company and eventually to King's personal accounts.
