More than 400 real estate managers and workers have been indicted in a broad-spectrum federal investigation of mortgage fraud. The FBI reported that the losses to homeowners resulting from the criminal conduct is over $1 billion. (That’s “billion.” With a “B.”)

From MSNBC.com’s article on the sweep:

Since March 1, 406 people have been arrested in the sting dubbed “Operation Malicious Mortgage” that saw 144 cases across the country. Sixty people were arrested on Wednesday alone, including in Chicago, Miami, Houston and a dozen other regions policed by the FBI.

In a separate sweep, two former Bear Stearns managers in New York were indicted and taken into custody Thursday on criminal charges related to the collapse of the subprime mortgage market. Matthew Tannin was taken into custody outside his New Jersey home and Ralph Cioffi was arrested at his New York City home, the FBI said.

An indictment unsealed in federal court charged both men with securities and wire fraud, and Cioffi with insider trading.

In a separate complaint filed Thursday, the Securities and Exchange Commission alleges that in the first five months of 2007, Tannin and Cioffi “deceived their own investors, as well as the fund’s institutional counterparts, by fraudulently concealing from them the full extent of the fund’s deepening troubles.”