Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Florida Court Enters $6.4M Judgment Against "Scalawag" In Nationwide "Cloud The Title" Real Estate Scam

From the Florida Attorney General's Office:
  • Attorney General Bill McCollum announced [last Thursday] that a U.S. citizen residing in Thailand has been ordered to pay $6.4 million for running an elaborate real estate scam that prevented landowners from selling their property to anyone but him. Todd Teal, 63, was found to have recorded fraudulent affidavits claiming he had an interest in the property, thereby preventing the owner from selling to anyone else. The case was prosecuted by the Attorney General’s Economic Crimes division.

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  • The Attorney General’s lawsuit, filed in June 2005, alleged that Teal used a mail drop box in Marco Island as his "local" address and used the internet to identify land held in Florida, mostly by out-of-state owners. Testimony from victims and witnesses revealed that Teal used deceptive contracts to induce landowners to contract with him. Teal then would refuse to make the deposit required by the contract, but would record a fraudulent affidavit in the public record against the landowner’s property. The affidavits recorded by Teal “clouded” the title to the property so that the landowner did not have a clear title and was prevented from selling to any other buyer. [...] McCollum’s investigators discovered that Teal has operated similar scams in Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Hawaii, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Washington.

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For more, see Thailand Resident Ordered to Pay $6.4 Million in Real Estate Scam.

For additional background on this case, see:

posted by Home Equity Theft Reporter at 7:58 AM