Scam Ends in Guilty Plea

A former Harvard Extension School student accused of running a complex real estate scam pled guilty to 15 counts of larceny in Cambridge District Court this month and was sentenced to two years’ probation, avoiding what seemed to be certain jail time.

Twenty-three-year-old Linda Vaghar was also ordered to repay all of her victims a total of $17,175 in restitution, and she is barred from leaving the state of Massachusetts until the payments are made, said Middlesex District Attorney (D.A.) spokeswoman Melissa Sherman. The court also ordered Vaghar to undergo treatment for substance abuse and a mental health evaluation.

Vaghar—who, according to friends at Harvard, frequented final clubs and partook in the undergraduate social scene before leaving the Extension School—admitted to running a real estate scam in which she used made-up e-mail addresses and fake bank accounts when subletting apartments to unsuspecting tenants. Over the course of a year, she allegedly defrauded at least 15 victims out of tens of thousands of dollars.

The alleged scam involved listing her Cambridge apartment for rent on Craigslist.com, convincing interested renters to pay her the first and last month’s rent, and then at the last minute making up sob stories—such as the death or sickness of a parent—to back out of the deal. The scam left victims struggling for months with a trail of excuses and bad checks in an effort to recover their money.

According to Shannon S. Christmas ’04, a victim of Vaghar’s scam who was present at the Sept. 9 hearing where she was sentenced, Vaghar, accompanied by her parents, remained unemotional as she spoke to District Court Judge Jonathan Brant.

“She didn’t appear to have any remorse and didn’t give any apologies,” Christmas said.

In March, a Cambridge District Court judge rejected a plea agreement between Vaghar and the D.A. that would have allowed Vaghar to avoid jail time, saying the deal was too lenient and instead recommending a sentence with a minimum of 60 days of jail time.

Vaghar will return to court on October 19 to finalize details on a payment plan for the restitution, according to Sherman.

Several of Vaghar’s victims expressed disappointment that she received no jail time.

“Just to see her get off like that after I went through all that was really quite sickening,” said Christmas, whom Vaghar has already repaid.

Posters to a blog that tracks the Vaghar case, conwoman.blogspot.com, expressed similar sentiments.

“Unreal-—how is it possible!!! Fifteen convictions and no jail time!” wrote a poster going by the pseudonym ‘AnotherLindyVictim.’

But one victim, who has not yet been paid back, thought that jail might not have been the right punishment.

“I actually think [the sentence] was about right,” said Kevin S. Mbugua, whom Vaghar still owes $900. “Regardless of how brutal she was in the way she treated people and the way she reacted to circumstances, I’m not sure how she would have fared incarcerated. I hope this way she gets back on the straight road.”

Vaghar’s attorney, Karen S. Shea, a lawyer at McGrath & Kane, did not return repeated requests for comment.

—Staff writer Reed B. Rayman can be reached at rrayman@fas.harvard.edu.