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181209 Sunday — Are Jim and Grace Victims of Title Fraud?

181209. Are Jim and Grace Victims of Title Fraud?

I'm concerned about my parents, Jim and Grace Kiraly. It's been reported to me that they might be the victims of Elder Abuse in the context of Title Fraud.

For those who might be able to com­ment, here's a link to a PDF that provides some updated in­forma­tion related to Jim, who seems to have relocated to Solvang, CA:

Click here for Jim_Kiraly_181213.pdf

A screen­shot of part of the PDF is provided be­low.

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Jim Kiraly details. Link to PDF file provided in post.
Jim Kiraly details

A private investigator, Keith Krasnove of Corporate Security Investigations, has visited the Kiraly house at 6329 Twinberry Circle, Avila Beach, CA on two occasions that I'm aware of recently.

The context was a wellness check. A police chief had commented to me, previously, that this might be a sensible check to conduct and had con­sid­er­ed handling this for me him­self.

The house is in a gated com­mun­i­ty. The com­mun­i­ty is some­times referred to as Avila Estates, but the correct name is appar­ent­ly San Luis Bay Estates.

Kiraly Avila Estates Research

There are two gates into the com­mun­i­ty. One of them is a “front” gate located next to Blue Heron Realty.

The “front” gate includes a guard-house which is open until 9:00pm daily. It's appar­ent­ly the same schedule 7 days a week, but this isn't con­firm­ed.

The 2nd gate is a “back” gate located next to a fire station. That gate uses buzz-through and/or RFID stickers.

The Realtor's office was under the impression that visitors are required to use the front, or guard, gate. However, I was told by one guard that visitors may use either gate.

If visitors weren't allowed to use the back gate, why would buzz-through be supported? And what would happen after 9:00pm when the guard-house closed?

I'm the one who “gathered” this in­forma­tion, to use a term from the 2012 to 2013 Gag Order Cases.

I hadn't had much experience with “gathering” this type of in­forma­tion prior to the cases, but I seem to have improved.

My un­der­stand­ing is that Keith parked near the rear gate, waited for some­body to open it and drive through it, and followed them through be­fore the gate closed.

It sounds sim­ple, but a lot of P.I.'s don't want to go to the bother of get­ting through the gate, so they'll press you to pay them thousands of dollars for “surveillance” instead.

“Surveillance” means that a P.I. will park out­side the gate and wait for hours to see if a subject happens to drive out. In such a case, the P.I. can fol­low them and gather in­forma­tion.

One prob­lem with this is that the P.I. is like­ly to lie about conducting surveil­lance. You'll pay thousands of dollars. In return, they'll go there just long enough to be able to prove that they were there.

Another prob­lem is that there may be two gates, as there were in this case. How is surveil­lance supposed to work, then?

Kiraly Research Cash

But the real issue is that, if you've identified a residential address and you'd sim­ply like to confirm physi­cal presence or do a wellness check, surveil­lance is absurd.

In this case, a P.I. needs to just go through the gate and knock on the door. If you ask a P.I. to do that and he or she presses for surveil­lance instead, you're dealing with a fraud who is hoping to steal thousands of dollars from you.

My favorite gated com­mun­i­ty story has to do with a P.I. who tried to convince me to pay him for surveil­lance by stating that he had a “reliable informant” in a gated com­mun­i­ty.

It was the same Avila Beach complex that Keith Krasnove visited later on and, in fact, the informant supposedly lived next door to Jim and Grace Kiraly.

“So,” the P.I. said, “they're con­firm­ed to be living there. Pay me thousands of dollars for surveil­lance and we're sure to get results”.

Lacking in intelligence

“Um, fool,” I replied, respectfully. “If there's a reliable informant living behind the gate, why would I pay you for surveillance? I'll pay you to talk to the informant instead. But he doesn't exist, you lying piece of sh*t.”

Actually, I spoke more casually. There's more to the story and it's pretty funny. I'll post the details another time.

Another favorite gated com­mun­i­ty story is about a courier who told me that there was a special way to clap.

This was in Texas. The subject in this case was my brother Tom Kiraly, VP of Hanger, Inc. It turned out to be a moot point because Tom lived in a gated house as opposed to a gated com­mun­i­ty. But we didn't know that initially.

Clap for Tom Kiraly

“Clap with the right rhythm,” the courier said, “and the gate will open like magic”.

I remain literal despite all that's hap­pen­ed. All that I've learned. So, I be­lieved him. When he realized this, he quickly explain­ed that he was joking.

That guy was great. I'd hired him to deliver a birthday card and a bottle of wine to Tom. Tom didn't seem to be home, so I told the courier to keep the wine for him­self.


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2016 birthday gift for Tom Kiraly, VP of Hanger, Inc.
Bottle of wine for Tom Kiraly, VP of Hanger, Inc.

On Decem­ber 6, 2018, Keith and a partner, Jackie Hermo, noticed that a door at the Kiraly house was unlocked. They entered the res­i­dence without instructions from me to do so. Keith explain­ed subsequently that this was out of concern for the safety of my parents.

Keith and Jackie found the house empty. Photo:

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P.I. bemused at empty house during wellness check
P.I. reports that door was unlocked

Krasnove reported:

“We then went to 6313 Twinberry and spoke to a man and woman. The man identified him­self as 'Jim Lawson'.”

In separate communications, Krasnove elaborated that “Jim Lawson” had rep­re­sen­ted himself as a “real estate agent”, that other neighbors had done so, or both.

He wasn't entirely clear about who had said what. But, close enough.

Krasnove continued:

“He [Jim Lawson] acted very sus­pi­cious and said James and Grace Kiraly were going to Texas to be with one of their sons. He then went with me to lock your parents' home. He said the home was being sold for $759,000.00.”

This doesn't seem odd so far. Jim and Grace might have talked to “Lawson” about the possibility that they'd move to be near my brother Tom Kiraly, a son who resides in Austin, Texas.

Jim and Grace have appar­ent­ly moved to Solvang, CA, instead. The fact that “Lawson” got the two destinations mixed up may not be sig­ni­fi­cant.

Or Jim may have instructed peo­ple to lie about his doings or whereabouts. But that doesn't add up, because some neighbors, at all of Jim's addresses over the past decade, have been positively chatty.

But Krasnove added:

“We ran a data base report of 6313 Twinberry Circle Avila Beach CA to attempt to determine whether the resident was 'Jim Lawson', the name given to us by the man who had the keys to your parents' home. The data base report that we obtained did not list Jim Lawson as a resident of that address.”

“We then at­tempt­ed to verify that James Lawson was licensed as a Real Estate salesman in Avila Beach or any place near Avila Beach.”

“We found that there was no James Lawson licensed as a Real Estate salesman in any area within a reason­able distance of Avila Beach.”

“Since the per­son told us that his name was 'Jim Lawson' we searched the Cal­i­for­nia State Real Estate License site and found no per­son by that name was licensed in Cal­i­for­nia.”

Krasnove summarized as follows: (edited for spelling and length)

“The next door neighbor who had the key appar­ent­ly refused to give his real name. His wife and he acted very sus­pi­cious. In add­i­tion, he told us a false story saying that your parents were buying a house in Texas to join your brother, when in fact they are in Solvang, Cal­i­for­nia.”

FBI

“We there­fore believe that your parents may be the victims of Title Fraud.”

Krasnove provided this FBI link as a reference:

Click here for FBI arti­cle

He closed by asking me to pay him hun­dreds of dollars in advance to look more close­ly at the situation.

So, Tom, Ken, Riane, etc., what do you make of all of this? Is some­body trying to lighten Jim's and Grace's wallets by $759,000? Or is this just a case of a shady P.I. diligently attempting to fatten his own wallet?

Keith Krasnove, FWIW, is an interesting character.

My first choice was a police chief who was in the pro­cess of transitioning to P.I. work. He'd have been able to get through the gate.

He talked about pos­si­bly just climbing over it. This is appar­ent­ly legal under some circumstances; if a police chief tells me that, I'm inclined to give some weight to the point.

But the police chief dropped out due to being a controversial fig­ure in that area. He decided that he'd bet­ter stick to mundane cases until he'd completed his transition.

So, I talked to Krasnove.

Krasnove definitely isn't inexperienced or run of the mill; that's why I hired him despite signs of poten­tial problems.

But he does seem shady. And he made an unusual threat on Decem­ber 4, 2018 which strongly sug­gest­ed that he was a con man.

I realized that my money was going to disappear with­out a trace. So, I made a gentle attempt to explain to Keith that it might be polite and appropriate for Corporate Security Investigations not to steal from me or to threaten me.

Keith and Jackie made the final visit to Twinberry Circle two days later.

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Corporate Security Investigations
Keith Krasnove and Jackie Hermo

Letter to Keith Krasnove

The Decem­ber 08, 2018 let­ter that I sent to Keith Krasnove has moved to the Corporate Security Investigations review page. To visit the page, click on the fol­low­ing link:

https://krasnove.com/

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