It's really amazing. You can get a 'disorderly persons' charge easier than you have to take personal responsibility for willingly participating in ... a fraud:
In a legal settlement with 11 states, Countrywide Financial Corp., the home mortgage lender bought by Bank of America Corp., will provide $8.4 billion in distressed borrower relief, including interest rate and loan principal reductions, to settle consumer fraud complaints. The measure is expected to affect about 400,000 homeowners, according to Attorneys General Lisa Madigan of Illinois and Edmund G. ``Jerry'' Brown of California.
