A California woman has been sentenced to 20 years in prison after carrying out a nearly $3.9 million scheme to take over an elderly man’s home.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California announced in a press release Monday that Caroline Joanne Herrling, also known as “Carrie Phenix,” was also ordered to pay $3,887,051 in restitution after she “fraudulently obtained title to real estate and money through identity theft and forged powers of attorney.”
According to the statement, Herrling, 44, and her co-conspirators began their scheme by looking for individuals who lived in wealthy neighborhoods and had run-down properties with “pools full of algae or overgrown brush.”
In 2020, the ruse led them to Sherman Oaks, California, the home of an “elderly man,” who died mysteriously in 2020, according to the release. He was later identified as Charles Wilding in a criminal complaint filed against Herrling, reviewed by PEOPLE.
The US attorney’s office said in a statement that while they are not sure how Wilding died, it is believed that “Herrling and others took possession of the property while his body was decomposing in his home.”
Charles Wilding.
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“Instead of reporting his death, Herrling and the co-conspirators left his body in his home while they looted his property. Herrling used a forged power of attorney form so she could pretend to be acting on behalf of the victim while stealing his real estate and financial accounts.” , the press release continues.
The lawsuit says Los Angeles police began investigating Wilding’s death in 2021 after he was reported missing and discovered Herrling’s fraud. She introduced herself as his “close friend”, listed herself as his family’s confidante and told police he had moved.
“She stated that Wilding was not home and was staying with a friend in the town of Carpinteria while she worked to get the house back in order, as it was in disarray and contained black mold,” the complaint states.
According to the press release, Herling and her co-conspirators moved the victim’s dead body into her apartment and attempted to dissolve it “in a mixture of chemicals.”
When that failed, the body was dismembered, placed in “vacuum bags” and dumped in San Francisco Bay. The remains were never found.
Authorities said in a statement that the victim was named executor and beneficiary of another victim’s will that Herrling forged and “claimed to have ‘discovered’ in a safe deposit box hired by the deceased victim’s mother.
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“Based on this forged will, the missing victim was to inherit an estate worth more than $1.7 million – assets that ultimately fell under Herrling’s control as trustee of his estate,” the statement said.
Herling also used forged documents to sell a home that belonged to Robert Tascon for nearly $1.5 million, according to the lawsuit.
“The buyer of Tascon’s property is currently in a civil dispute with Tascon’s estate. Tascon died on September 11, 2022 from a gunshot wound to the head, which police determined was a suicide,” the lawsuit added.
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One of Herling’s accomplices, Matthew Jason Kroth, 50, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine in October 2023.
Kroth faces up to 20 years in federal prison for wire fraud and up to 40 years for trafficking methamphetamine, according to the release. The sentencing is scheduled for June 7.
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Source: HIS Education