How Dozens in Southern Dallas Were Swindled Out of Homes — Under the Government’s Nose

The smooth-talking man with earnest eyes and a firm handshake strode into the county records building downtown. It was early 2015, and for the next year and a half, he would return near weekly, each time in the company of a different person he was selling a home to. The man's name was Carl Govan Jr., and the houses he sold in southern Dallas were mostly boarded-up, blighted and vacant. But for his poor and sometimes undocumented buyers, the shells of homes represented their chance at the American dream. The buyers thought they had no reason to doubt the polite man clutching the house keys, with his yes-sirs and no-ma'ams. After all, they were at a government building, getting government-stamped papers they believed proved ownership.   Continue reading...