Webster Bank was "caught unawares" by a subpoena issued Tuesday regarding an apparently high number of Federal Housing Administration loan defaults, according to a bank spokesman.

Ed Steadham, spokesman for the Waterbury, Conn.-based bank, said bank officials are working to provide the 20 or so files requested by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, but had yet to complete the request as of Wednesday morning.

Fifteen mortgage lenders across the country snagged the attention of HUD’s Office of the Inspector General for having an unusually high number of defaulted FHA loans that triggered payouts from the FHA’s mortgage insurance fund. Now the inspector is looking into possible fraud from those lenders.

"We aren’t making any accusations at this time, we have no evidence of wrongdoing, but we will aggressively pursue indicators of fraud," said HUD Inspector General Kenneth M. Donohue.

The $17.7 billion Webster Bank, which has locations throughout Boston, southern Massachusetts and Connecticut, runs its mortgage operations out of Cheshire, Conn.

Steadham said FHA loans make up about 5 percent to 7 percent of the bank’s total mortgage volume, but on Wednesday morning he could not provide data on how many of those loans defaulted. The bank made about $1 billion in mortgage loans last year, he added.

Steadham reiterated HUD’s position that this was an exploratory request, and that the bank would provide data as quickly as it could.

The Mortgage Bankers Association also chimed in Tuesday, lauding regulators for aggressively pursuing fraud inspection and risk control, but the association also cautioned that the 15 lenders involved should be given their due process.