FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday, June 5, 2025
Disbarred Attorney Convicted of Stealing Deeds of 11
Brooklyn Properties in Decade-Long Fraudulent Scheme
Defendant Targeted Minority Homeowners Facing Foreclosure;
Now Facing Mandatory Prison Time
Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez today announced the conviction of a disbarred Brooklyn attorney who stole the deeds to 11 residential properties across Brooklyn, primarily from minority homeowners in financial distress. The defendant falsely promised to help facilitate short sales, but instead transferred ownership of the homes to himself or companies he controlled.
District Attorney Gonzalez said, “This defendant didn’t just steal homes — he stole stability, equity and the future that these families worked hard to build. He preyed on Brooklyn homeowners already in crisis, including a nurse, cab driver and home health aide, by posing as a trusted advisor. This sentence makes clear that we will not allow fraudsters to exploit vulnerable New Yorkers or profit from a housing crisis and highlights my office’s success in prosecuting deed theft.”
The District Attorney identified the defendant as Sanford Solny, 68, of Midwood, Brooklyn. He was convicted today of 13 counts of third-degree criminal possession of stolen property, three counts of first-degree scheme to defraud and one count of third-degree grand larceny in connection with 11 properties following a bench trial before Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Danny Chun. Eleven corporations owned by the defendant, one for each property, were also convicted of 13 counts of third-degree criminal possession of stolen property and one count of third-degree grand larceny (the judge acquitted the defendant of charges pertaining to one property as well as of additional charges pertaining to the 11 properties). As a predicate felon, the defendant is facing mandatory prison time when he’s sentenced on September 17, 2025, with the maximum sentence for the top count he was convicted of being three and a half to seven years in prison.
The District Attorney said that, according to the evidence, between 2012 and 2022, the defendant, whose law license was suspended in 2012 before he was disbarred in 2023, carried out a fraudulent real estate scheme targeting homeowners in foreclosure. He presented himself as a financial expert who could negotiate with lenders to sell the homes for less than what was owed on the mortgage — a process known as a short sale — to help clients avoid foreclosure. Instead, using an array of false statements, he tricked his victims into unwittingly signing over their deeds to corporations he controlled.
The defendant defrauded 15 victims, many of whom had limited legal or financial literacy by convincing them they were getting help. Instead, the defendant transferred ownership of their homes to his companies and in some cases collected rent from tenants already living there. The 11 properties included homes in Bedford-Stuyvent, East Flatbush, Canarsie, East New York and Ocean Hill, among other neighborhoods. Victims lost their homes, their equity and, in many cases, suffered damage to their credit as the foreclosure proceedings remained unresolved.
Since 2017, the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office has obtained 30 indictments against 42 defendants in numerous deed theft cases, pertaining to over 70 properties. All of these cases resulted in convictions – leading to many carceral sentences – except for five that are still pending. Most of the defendants were skilled scammers, including disbarred attorneys and repeat offenders, who targeted and harmed multiple victims. These many successful prosecutions have significantly contributed to the overall precipitous drop since 2017 in the number of deed fraud complaints made by Brooklyn residents to the city’s Department of Finance. The DA’s Office remains committed to safeguarding homeownership and ensuring justice for communities harmed by these predatory schemes.
The case was prosecuted by Senior Assistant District Attorney Joseph DiBenedetto, of the District Attorney’s Frauds Bureau and Assistant District Attorney Gregory C. Pavlides, Chief of the Frauds Bureau, under the supervision of Assistant District Attorney Michel Spanakos, Deputy Chief of the Investigations Division, and the overall supervision of Assistant District Attorney Patricia McNeill, Chief of the Investigations Division.
#