A 47-year-old registered sex offender previously convicted of loan fraud pleaded guilty to securities fraud in Orange County and was sentenced to five years in prison, according to court records obtained Tuesday.
Carlos Jose Centeno pleaded guilty Friday to seven counts of untrue statements or omission in connection with the purchase or sale of a security and four counts of money laundering, all felonies. As part of the plea deal, a count of using a device or scheme to defraud was dismissed.
Centeno also admitted sentencing enhancements for aggravated white collar crime between $100,000 to $500,000.
The crimes were committed between August 2019 through April 2022, according to the criminal complaint.
The Yorba Linda resident pleaded guilty in a $390,000 loan modification scheme in January 2020. In August 2020 he was placed on seven years of probation and sentenced to a year in jail.
Centeno also pleaded guilty Sept. 28, 2021, to contacting a minor with the intent to commit a sex offense, attempted lewd act on a child 14 or 15 and meeting a minor to commit lewd conduct, all felonies. He was sentenced to 32 months in prison.
“Probationer’s progress on probation can only be described as poor,” a probation official said in court papers in 2023 when he was arrested.
Centeno was arrested for driving drunk Nov. 11, 2020, and sentenced to serve a year in jail that was suspended previously in the loan-modification case.
Centeno was arrested March 6, 2023, for public intoxication and failing to register as a sex offender and resisting arrest, according to probation officials. He pleaded guilty on Sept. 29, 2023, to resisting arrest as part of a plea deal and was sentenced to 120 days in jail, or time already served behind bars, probation officials said.
Centeno owes $468,779.89 in restitution in the loan modification scheme but hasn’t made the payments as required, probation officials said.
“The probationer’s brazen behavior is an indication that he has no intention of complying with the orders of the court,” probation officials said in a petition to revoke his probation in 2023.
In 2014, Centeno tried to kiss the 15-year-old daughter of his friend, but she rejected him and reported it to authorities, according to court records. A sheriff’s deputy pretended to be the girl in a text message to Centeno, who sent back lewd messages and agreed to a meeting, but when he showed up he was arrested, according to court records.