SANTA ANA – An Aliso Viejo man and a partner from Long Beach were sentenced to prison terms Tuesday for their roles in a mortgage-modification scheme that targeted 1,500-plus struggling homeowners and defrauded more than $9 million.

Charles Wayne Farris, 65, of Aliso Viejo was ordered to serve 47 months in prison, while Ronald Rodis, 52, of Long Beach was sentenced to 41 months, according to the U.S. Attorneys Office.

Both men previously pleaded guilty to felony counts of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud. Along with their time behind bars, Rodis was ordered to pay about $3.8 million in restitution, and Farris is supposed to pay $3.5 million.

The scheme, which took place from October 2008 to June 2009, was masterminded by Bryan D’Antonio, a Brea man who had already been convicted of a previous medical-billing scam.

D’Antonio was the owner and operator of the Rodis Law Group, which later changed its name to America’s Law Group. Farris was a managing director, the indictment says, and Rodis was a senior partner.

Through radio advertisements, the company claimed to employ an experienced team of attorneys who could help homeowners negotiate lower interest rates or even lower principal balances.

Those attorneys didn’t exist, prosecutors said, with the business instead acting as little more than a boiler room where banks of telemarketers fielded calls from desperate, financially strapped homeowners.

Rodis, a licensed attorney at the time of the scheme, allowed his name to be used for the company to add legitimacy to the business, prosecutors said. He has since surrendered his law license.

Farris supervised the telemarketers who made up the workforce.

Both men hid the involvement of D’Antonio, who due to his earlier conviction, was barred from being involved in any telemarketing, prosecutors added.

“These defendants played key roles in a scheme that victimized homeowners facing foreclosure during the mortgage crisis,” said Chad A. Readler, an acting assistant attorney general, in a statement. “The defendants promised homeowners assistance saving their homes and modifying their mortgages, yet took their money knowing the promised benefits would never be realized.”

Earlier this year, D’Antonio was sentenced to 97 months in prison after agreeing to a plea deal acknowledging that he defrauded more than 1,500 people out of $9 million.

U.S. District Judge David O. Carter, who sentenced all three defendants, has noted that the actual monetary impact of the fraud was likely much higher, because many victims lost homes with equity.