SACRAMENTO -- Federal prosecutors said Friday that they charged a suspect in a $100 million mortgage fraud and investment scheme that spanned five states after he fled the country in a private jet this week.

Assistant U.S. attorneys Matt Stegman and Russell Carlberg said 27-year-old Christopher J. Warren of Sacramento had been cooperating in their investigation before he fled. They believe he flew to Mexico on Monday by chartering a private jet for $156,000.

Federal agents are investigating Warren, directors of Loomis Wealth Solutions, a Roseville-based investment company, and people affiliated with several related companies.

A sworn statement by an Internal Revenue Service agent said they had defrauded investors and mortgage companies of $100 million since 2006, although an attorney for the owner of Loomis Wealth Solutions denied his client did anything illegal.

Warren's attorney, Donald Heller, did not return a telephone message Friday.

Warren's arrest warrant says the scam involved 500 properties in at least five states, including Arizona, California, Florida and Illinois. The fifth state was not disclosed.

New York-based Citimortgage Inc. alone lost more than $6 million on 15 bogus loans, according to the IRS affidavit. The other lenders were not listed.

Warren prepared the applications for the loans granted by Citimortgage, the affidavit said.

Federal prosecutors charged Warren on Wednesday with conspiracy to commit bank fraud, which carries a maximum 30-year prison term. He also was charged with mail fraud, which can bring up to 20 years in prison, and with conducting a continuing financial crime, which carries a possible sentence of 10 years to life.

If Warren is captured, he also could be charged with flight to avoid prosecution.

Warren also is known as Mark A. Seagrave, according to the arrest warrant.

Carlberg said Warren met several times with prosecutors and agents from the IRS and FBI, providing them with incriminating documents. They said he apparently hoped to have the charges and any sentence reduced, although prosecutors said they made him no promises.

This week, Warren posted on a Web site a seven-page account of his years of wrongdoing since joining the mortgage broker industry, according to the arrest warrant and an attached copy of the Web posting. He sent the same account in an e-mail to a reporter at The Sacramento Bee on Sunday, a day before he chartered the jet.

"It was an incredibly idiotic thing to do," Heller, his attorney, told The Sacramento Bee.

Warren's Web posting purports to tell the story of his rise and fall.

"As a 19 then 20 year old boy, my managers and handlers taught me the ins and outs of mortgage fraud, drugs, sex and money, money, and more money," it says. "Looking back on the life I have led, I beg a higher power for forgiveness. For mercy … I helped ruin this nations (sic) economy. Almost a billion dollars of toxic assets came from me making others above me rich beyond my imagination."

Prosecutors allege that Loomis Wealth Solutions attracted investors through public investment seminars. They could not say how many investors were defrauded.

First, the investors bought a life insurance policy through the company's president, Lawrence Leland "Lee" Loomis, prosecutors said.

Next, they invested their home equity and retirement plans through the company in what prosecutors allege was a Ponzi scheme that used money from later investors to pay off earlier investors. By the time authorities raided the company in August, the fund -- which had guaranteed investors 12 percent annual returns -- had just $1,700 in its account, according to the IRS affidavit.

Finally, investors were used to purchase real estate under false premises from lenders across the nation, prosecutors said .

The investors were "offered the opportunity" to serve as what the company called "nominees" to purchase residential properties, according to the complaint filed against Warren . The investors unwittingly served as straw buyers to defraud lenders, including Citimortgage, prosecutors said.

The investors were told rental income from the properties was being used to pay off the loans, and that Loomis was paying the mortgages. In fact, investigators say 80 percent of the homes were vacant.

Prosecutors say the companies altered "tax forms, rental income and other financial information to get loans approved on a massive scale."

Loomis' attorney, Patrick Hanly, said the government's case rests on Warren.

"His credibility is the only thing the government's got, and his credibility has now taken a huge shot," Hanly said. "My client's position is there was no fraudulent activity. He denies all those allegations by Warren, that Mr. Loomis was involved in any criminal wrongdoing, and looks forward to clearing his name."

Loomis, 51, has not been charged.

In September, prosecutors charged 27-year-old Garret Griffith Gililland III of Chico in connection with the alleged fraud. He also is believed to have fled the country.

Prosecutors on Friday said one of Warren's employees also fled to Mexico on Monday ahead of criminal charges, though he used a commercial airliner instead of a private jet.

Scott Edward Cavell, 25, of Sacramento, was a "personal account manager" under Warren, one of the employees the IRS says routinely inflated investors' income, savings and other wealth to defraud lenders. The investors were used for "stated income" loans that required no verification.

Cavell is charged with conspiracy to commit bank and mail fraud, which carries a 30-year maximum sentence, and obtaining a passport under an alias of Adam Kingsbury Curry, which could bring 10 years.