Queens Deed Thief Saunders Gets 3-9 Years

NEW YORK, NY – Stacie Saunders, a former mortgage bank branch manager, is headed to prison for her crucial role in a brazen Queens deed theft ring that preyed on vulnerable homeowners. Saunders was sentenced today to three to nine years behind bars for helping steal three homes in Jamaica and St. Albans, raking in over $1 million in illegal profits with her crew.

New York Attorney General Letitia James announced the sentencing, marking the final conviction in the OAG’s investigation. “New Yorkers should never have to fear losing their homes to scammers and thieves like Stacie Saunders and her associates,” James stated. “This deed theft ring preyed on vulnerable homeowners with their deceptive schemes, but my office has successfully brought them all to justice.”

Saunders, along with ringleader Marcus Wilcher, disbarred attorney Anyekache Hercules, Jerry Currin, and Dean Lloyd, targeted elderly and absentee homeowners. The scheme, uncovered in 2019, involved forging documents, identity theft, and manipulating the system to quickly offload stolen properties. Wilcher scouted rundown homes with vulnerable owners. Hercules, already a convicted deed thief, forged the necessary legal paperwork – often using the identity of a practicing attorney to further obscure the fraud. Saunders, leveraging her real estate license, then marketed the stolen homes to investors at deeply discounted prices, ensuring rapid sales.

The operation was cold and calculated. Wilcher secured sensitive personal information – Social Security numbers, birthdates – to create falsified documents once an investor showed interest. Saunders arranged for lookalikes to impersonate the actual homeowners during contract signings and closings, orchestrating the entire process, including attorneys and scheduling. Once the sales went through, the crew opened bank accounts in the names of the real owners using forged IDs and siphoned the over $1 million in proceeds through a network of LLCs and shell entities.

This isn’t a standalone case. Hercules was previously convicted of deed theft in Kings County and sentenced to one and a half to three years in September 2024. Wilcher, convicted of Grand Larceny in the Second Degree for the theft of five homes (three with this ring), received a three to nine-year sentence in July 2024. Currin and Lloyd both pleaded guilty to Offering a False Instrument for Filing in the First Degree. A Queens jury convicted Saunders on 18 counts in May, including Grand Larceny in the Second Degree, Scheme to Defraud in the First Degree, Money Laundering in the Second Degree, and Forgery in the Second Degree.

With Saunders’ sentencing, the Attorney General’s Office has officially closed the book on this particularly vile chapter of Queens real estate crime. But James vowed to continue fighting deed theft and other frauds across the state, warning that vulnerable homeowners remain prime targets for these ruthless predators. The Grimy Times will continue to monitor these cases and expose the criminals preying on New Yorkers.