A third defendant charged in a mortgage fraud scheme involving two properties on Oahu pleaded guilty yesterday in federal court.

Paula Galacgac, 45, pleaded guilty to conspiring to make false statements on loan applications and to commit mail and wire fraud. She faces a maximum of five years in prison and a possible order to pay restitution when she is sentenced in April.

Galacgac told U.S. Magistrate Judge Kevin Chang that she put false income information on the loan application of a so-called straw purchaser. She said she also indicated that the purchaser intended to live in the home he was purchasing even though she knew that was false.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Clare Connors said Galacgac, a loan officer with a mortgage broker company, signed the loan application, verifying the information on the application, for the purchase of a home on Mokapu Boulevard in Kailua. She said Galacgac prepared another loan application for the purchase of a home on 16th Avenue in Kaimuki but had her boss, Antonio Alcantara Jr., sign it.

Albert Alimoot and Evan Koizumi, whom the government identified as the straw purchasers of the two properties, pleaded guilty Monday.

Alcantara; Ira Altwegg, a loan processor for another mortgage broker; and John Mendoza are scheduled to stand trial in March.

Connors said Galacgac identified people who were facing financial difficulty or foreclosure and along with Mendoza persuaded them to sell their homes to the straw purchasers, who had no intention of paying off the mortgage or living in the home. In exchange, the sellers would get a share of the proceeds and remain in their homes.