One thing I should do is explain why some of us are opposing the Golden River quiet title suit. Contrary to what some people want to believe, it isn’t about the person involved, it’s about the land, the parcels of abandoned property currently assessed to the defunct Great Southwestern Land Company and referred to locally in our own slang term as “green lots”. They are scattered all over the Great Southwestern subdivisions. I have several near me and pay property taxes on two of them. A lot of property owners out here do the same with the green lots near them. As all of the Great Southwestern Subdivisions were created in a real estate scam that was prosecuted at the federal level, the original subdivider never took into consideration that people would actually live out here some day. A subdivision like this would not be allowed these days. If every lot were inhabited, it would be a post apocalyptic suburban ghetto with no water. The existence of all these empty lots that are not on the real estate market keeps this place livable and most of us would like to keep them as they are, as open space that can’t be built on. We don’t want them to be claimed by someone filing a quiet title suit knowing that Great Southwestern Land Co. is dead and that a default judgement is likely. That has happened several times in the past but it’s always been an owner of multiple lots who included the green lots bordering their property in their suit. Since the rest of the suit was perfectly legitimate, the green lots claimed passed under the radar. In the case of the Golden River suit and the previous one in 2004 by Golden River’s owner, that has not been the case. What we are concerned about to the point of paying and attorney to intervene in these two suits is the horrible precedent it would set and that someone getting such a valuable piece of real estate in a crooked law suit would attract similar land grabs and all of the huge number of green lots in our quiet community would be overrun with scammers and squatters. Those that live near the land in the quiet title suit are particularly concerned and would be the most affected but all land owners in all the Great Southwestern Subdivisions will be affected by the court precedent.
In reference to the “green” lots themselves, the current assessment to Great Southwestern Land Co. is only accurate in some cases. I’ve done a complete title search on the two I pay taxes on and both were sold by Great Southwestern in the early 1960s and one sold again in 1966. Both were auctioned off by the state in the January 1975 tax auction and purchased by the Cayman International Corporation and that was the last legitimate owner who they should be assessed to. The Taos county assessor’s office only has records going back to the year 2000. I’ve heard stories about how the older records were lost but I don’t know if any of them are true and accurate. The Taos County Clerk’s office has a much better system and I’ve spent many hours researching the green land there. I did a very thorough search of the land in the Golden River suit and there is no record of the Great Southwestern Land Co. ever transferring title of that land to anyone. In the case of that parcel, the assessment, as far as my research has led me to believe, is correct. There are lots of fake deeds filed on some or all of that land but none have been convincing enough for the assessment to be changed. The owner of Golden River has filed four of them, all quitclaim deeds. The first was filed in 2014 and deeds part of the property from herself to Golden River LLC. The next three were filed last year just before the quiet title suit was filed. The first two of these three were notarized in 2004 and are from two people in the community to Golden River’s owner for all the land in the suit except two lots. Neither had any legitimate claim to the property and I assume that the attorney in the 2004 quiet title suit was a bit more cautious and advised against filing fake deeds. The third is a another deed from Golden River’s owner to Golden River. It amounts to a fictitious chain of title that goes back to 2004. What’s missing is any deed that goes beyond that point. A chain of title has to be complete and this one has a severe gap and also has multiple invalid deeds to the same property. One of the claims that Golden River’s owner has made is that she has “documents”. Well, she does because she created them herself. There are no documents in the Taos County Clerk’s transferring title to that land to her other than her own. Misdeeds in the literal sense. Here they are.
https://tresorejas.org/pdf/Misdeeds_GoldenRiver.pdf
It’s obvious that the handwriting on the 2004 deeds is same as on the 2014 deed. Neither “Grantor” on the 2004 deeds had any real claim to the property. No one does, Great Southwestern never sold it. Even the one lot that is excluded from the 2014 deeds has a questionable chain of title and it just ends abruptly with a grantee with no grantor and it looks like someone just filed an invalid deed with the county for that one lot and it flew under the radar.
One response to “The “Green” Land Question and the Misdeeds Involved”
Thank you. My concerns, exactly; to eliminate the possibility of precedence setting and to alert county and state citizens that these nefarious dealings must not continue to go unopposed. Giving away land to other entities and countries? Not in my backyard. Great citizen journalism. Plead the First! Right on!