SANTO DOMINGO.- The forgers don’t detain their pace in the effort to validate their actions before the various agencies to strip real estate from legitimate owners, who are victims of a new maneuver that includes the cloning of their identity cards.

However so far this year the authorities have "snagged" 120 people, and filed charges against them in 48 cases in the courts.

Of those cases 30 are in Higüey, involving just parcel 67-B (rest.), one of the biggest portions of land in the country, with more than 48 million square meters owned by the State.

The signatures of the Justice, and Foreign Relations ministries and consuls are also the forgers’ victims, because in they figure as having validated them in documents taken to the Titles Registry.

Superior Land Court prosecutor Fermín Casilla said associations are involved in those maneuvers; one person forging the document, taken to an office of the Internal Taxes Agency to pay transference or mortgage levies, one deposits it in the Titles Registry; the lawyers who notarize the signatures and other members of the ring.

One of the most notorious cases of forgery he notes is the fraud worth more than RD$50 million against the Major League baseball player Julio Lugo, in which charges were filed against two men.

To carry out their swindle, the official said the forgers locate a building or a lot, obtain a copy if the certificate of title, pay a newspaper ad to declare the deed as lost. They then sing a power-of-attorney noting that the property’s owner presumably authorizes the declaration of the loss, documents that are deposited with a sworn statement where it’s noted that no operation has been conducted.

“They get a title issued, retrieve it and then transfer it with the same power-of-attorney to another person for a certain amount of money."

Casilla said the forgers even go further, making two transfers to make it seem that the second is a buyer in good faith, to get the Registry of Titles to issue their certificate.  He said they’ve even forged the signatures of the Legalization Department’s chief, and the Foreign Ministry, when they are documents supposedly sent from the United States.

However he affirmed that these criminal actions haven’t fooled the vigilance by the Land Court Prosecutor and the Title Registry, which have voided those documents, arrested suspects and have filed charges against the forgers.