Victor Quimis, 40, of Queens pleaded guilty Nov. 5 to using forged deeds to take an elderly widow’s house and borrow $552,500 against it. New York Attorney General Letitia James announced the plea. It is the first conviction under the state’s criminal deed theft law, and sentencing is set for Jan. 15, 2027.
The house in Kew Gardens Hills belonged to Renuka Bherwani, who had owned it since 1986 with her late husband, Mohan. She was receiving hospice care at home when the deeds were forged. She died in June 2025.
Two forged deeds in two months
Prosecutors say the scheme began in October 2024. Quimis and Deepa Roy, 69, of Manhattan allegedly forged a deed that handed the house to themselves for nothing. The notary stamp on it was forged too, carried the wrong date and was tied to a Nassau County notary.
They also forged other transfer papers, including a water and sewer billing form filed with the New York City Department of Environmental Protection. That form is how the theft finally came to light.
In December 2024, a second forged deed moved the house into Hunter Studios & Developer Corp., a company Quimis owned. The notary signature on that deed was forged as well. A deed is the document that records who owns a home, so each forged page put a stranger closer to looking like the owner on paper.
The family found out by accident. Bherwani’s son and daughter-in-law, Kamal and Sabita Bherwani, were opening mail at the house in December 2024 when they found a city letter congratulating Quimis as the “new owner.” They reported it to the attorney general’s office that month. Homeowners, and relatives who handle mail for an older owner, face the same question: has any notice about a deed, a mortgage or a water account arrived in a name the family does not know? Anyone who suspects deed theft can call the attorney general’s office at 1-800-771-7755 or email [email protected]. Confidential complaints can also be filed online, and people who are deaf or hard of hearing can call 1-800-788-9898.
Stay ahead of scam news: Miss an enrollment or claim deadline and the money can be gone. Join the Retirement Money Brief and we’ll send you our Scam & Identity-Theft Action Card as a welcome gift.
Get the Brief + the scam action card →
We may earn a commission from links on this page.
Where the $552,500 went
With the company holding the title, Quimis took out a $552,500 mortgage on the house. In plain terms, a lender advanced that money against a home whose real owner never agreed to any of it. The attorney general’s office says he used the loan to pay off Bherwani’s existing mortgage and liens, then moved the remaining $312,037.57 into Hunter Studios bank accounts for personal use.
The office says Quimis stole more than $300,000. Roy allegedly received at least $15,000 of the proceeds by bank check, with the memo line “Per agreement.” She pleaded not guilty, and a trial is scheduled for Feb. 8, 2027. The charges against her are accusations, and she is presumed innocent.
What the plea means for the house
Quimis pleaded guilty in Queens County Supreme Court, before Judge Leigh Cheng, to two counts of first-degree grand larceny and to residential mortgage fraud in the second degree. The attorney general’s office says he is expected to be sentenced Jan. 15 to one and a half to four and a half years in state prison. The sentence is final only when the judge imposes it.
Both forged deeds are to be vacated at sentencing, which returns the house to the family. The office also says it will ask the court to void the $552,500 mortgage Quimis took out against it.
Kamal Bherwani, Renuka’s son and the executor of her estate, said, “Deed theft targets the elderly and the vulnerable,” and urged families to call the attorney general’s office right away. James said Quimis “preyed on an elderly woman at the end of her life to steal the home she owned for nearly 40 years.”
First conviction under a 2024 law
New York made deed theft a crime in 2024, in a law sponsored by state Sen. Zellnor Myrie. His office describes the offense as taking the title to a home without the owner’s knowledge or approval, a form of grand larceny, and says the law gives the attorney general new tools to investigate and prosecute it.
Myrie’s office says the practice falls hardest on elderly homeowners, homeowners of color and lower-income owners, especially in gentrifying neighborhoods. The first indictments under the law came Aug. 8, 2025, in this same Queens case. When the charges were announced, the attorney general’s office said the two defendants faced a maximum of eight and one-third to 25 years in prison if convicted.
Queens Borough President Donovan Richards Jr. said the case is “exactly the kind of crime the state’s new anti-deed theft law is intended to deter.” James said her office “will continue to combat deed theft and keep New Yorkers in their homes.”
The open piece is January. The judge decides the sentence Jan. 15, the court acts on the two deeds and the mortgage, and the Bherwani family waits to learn when the house is formally theirs again.
Who is watching an older relative’s mail and accounts?
The Queens theft surfaced only because a letter from a city agency reached the family’s mailbox. Deed theft is a crime against a house, and the attorney general’s hotline is the place to report it. The rest of a household’s money has its own entry points: a credit file, a bank login, a retirement account that a thief can reach with a stolen identity.
Scam-Proof Your Accounts in a Weekend is a 13-page guide with ten moves in weekend order, built to lock those entry points. It covers how to freeze your credit at all three bureaus, free by federal law, and how to lock your bank logins with two-step login, alerts and a verbal password. It does not cover deeds or title records; those go to the attorney general.
Get the 10-move weekend lockdown guide for accounts a deed thief could reach next →
This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
