A former NASA scientist has pleaded guilty to mortgage fraud after fabricating income records to finance the purchase of an $850,000 luxury home in Texas.
Noreen Khan, 52, and her husband, Christopher Mayberry, 53, purchased the luxury home in Missouri City, TX, in 2017, when Khan was working at NASA as a space toxicologist and Mayberry was employed as a NASA contractor.
In plea agreements, Khan and Mayberry admitted to taking out numerous, significant personal loans to cover the down payment on the home based on falsified income documents, before defaulting on those loans and falsely claiming identity theft.
Court documents stated that in 2019, the couple applied for a new loan to finance the Missouri City home, but said the property would be used as an investment or resale property and not as their primary home. A loan was approved for $820,000.
The government’s investigation also revealed that, in 2020, Khan tried to wipe away the loan debt by claiming her identity had been stolen and disputed the accounts on her credit report. Kahn filed lawsuits against the creditors to try to eliminate the debt. The lenders eventually “charged off” $276,709.42 of debt owed by the couple.
It didn’t end there. Court documents state that in 2021, the couple refinanced their Missouri City loan for $895,000. During that process, an October 2020 bank statement was altered, changing the account owner’s name from Khan to her husband, Mayberry.
The investigation also found that tax records and pay stubs were falsified to show that NASA was Mayberry’s employer, when in actuality, Mayberry was just a NASA contractor on behalf of Mori & Associates. All of the loans were signed by Mayberry.
Kahn resigned from NASA on Sept. 29, 2021, and closed on the refinance on Oct. 6, 2021.
The couple pleaded guilty to the fraud charges and face up to five years in federal prison and up to a $250,000 maximum fine. They also risk losing the Missouri City home. They must also pay restitution of $276,709 before sentencing, which is set for Dec. 18.
Mortgage fraud on the rise
About 1 in 116 mortgage applications contained fraud in the second quarter of 2025, according to Cotality’s National Mortgage Application Fraud Risk Index.
The data shows the two riskiest investments for mortgage fraud are investment properties and multiunit properties.
“The increase in the fraud risk can partly be attributed to the volatility starting to be seen in the real estate market,” Matt Seguin, senior principal of mortgage fraud solutions, said in the Cotality report. “Interest rate cuts haven’t come at the rate expected over the last year, so purchase transactions, which, historically speaking, have higher fraud risk, continue to represent almost 70% of the applications seen by Cotality.”
Cotality analyzed data in six categories of mortgage fraud: identity, transaction, property, income, occupancy, and undisclosed real estate. The research found that every category except occupancy saw an increase in the second quarter.
The largest year-over-year increases were in undisclosed real estate debt and transaction fraud risk. Undisclosed real estate debt rose 12% this year, compared with a 5.9% decline year over year in 2024. Transaction fraud risk increased 6.2% this year, following a 4.9% increase last year.
The study found several factors contributing to the increase in fraud, including higher insurance costs, home prices, mortgage rates, and the growing popularity of non-qualify mortgage loans—where applicants do not need to meet the strict guidelines for qualified mortgages that are set by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
The three states leading the way when it comes to mortgage fraud are New York, Rhode Island, and Florida.