Update: Nancy Carroll was sentenced to ten years of prison, no mention made of probation, yet. She was led to prison in handcuffs directly from the courtroom.
And there are reports she’s gonna get a light sentence.
We call it your worst real estate nightmare: You close on your home, but the sales funds actually don’t pay off your mortgage. Instead, someone keeps paying your mortgage for you and absconds with your pay off funds. He or she uses the money to support their lavish lifestyle. Sound familiar?
We have covered the story of Nancy Carroll, the prominent Southlake title agent whose title company was raided by the Texas Department of Insurance about two years ago. Regulators said they were looking for $3 million missing from the company’s escrow accounts, and $2 million from separate investor accounts.
Nancy Jackson Spinks, also known as Nancy Carroll, was finally arrested in February, 2016, in a north shore suburb of Chicago. She was renting a 6,000-square-foot home in Lake Forest, Ill. That’s some of the priciest dirt on the North Shore.
Nancy’s business, Millennium Title, was taken over by the Texas Department of Insurance in February of 2016 when regulators said it had become insolvent and Nancy, the owner, had disappeared. Nearly $3 million had vanished from the company’s escrow account. At the time, sources told me the funds stolen could be as high as $30 million.
Nancy had been living in Lake Forest, Illinois, a north shore Chicago suburb, where she had rented a house until police caught up with her. According to a source, Nancy was up north visiting her sister, Diana Stehling, who lives there with her children and husband. Diana is a CPA, according to my sources. Nancy was caught when she went out to eat at a Chicago area mall and paid for her food with her PayPal account. Mall security was notified that she was “wanted,” and she was arrested while walking to her 16 year-old-son’s Mercedes. She was then extradited back to Texas (click on this link for the Motion for Substituted Service).
Nancy’s crime carries punishment of five to 99 years in prison. But she could also be eligible for parole, according to prosecutors. And sources are telling me that she could get off on something called “Shock Probation” (we are researching), sort of a back door to a light probation. Remember, too, that Nancy Carroll was also a practicing attorney. The hearing is at 9 a.m. January 3, in Judge George Gallagher’s courtroom, the 396th District Court in Tarrant County.
Here is what Carroll pleaded guilty to: misappropriation of fiduciary property and theft of $1.6 million.
Her attorney offered this statement:
“Ms. Carroll admits her responsibility for the conduct alleged in the indictment and is prepared to receive her punishment at the appropriate time,” he said.
