Local TV station tackles mortgage mess as investigative reporter discovers he’s a victim, too

Poynter.org:

The station’s chief investigative reporter, George Knapp, found himself victimized by the very system the station was investigating.

Knapp was interviewing attorney Tisha Black, considered one of Vegas’ premier foreclosure lawyers, when she told him that “9 of every 10 people she sees who bought homes out of foreclosure have some kind of problem with their chain of title.”

Knapp said he wondered if she was exaggerating and mentioned that he had purchased a foreclosed home from a bank. Within a few minutes, she handed over a stack of papers showing the reporter that he had been taken in by the very fraud that he was investigating. The Nevada Attorney General’s Office confirmed to Knapp that he does not own his home because of bogus signatures and improper filings on his home’s title.

Knapp told me:

Needless to say, this put me in an awkward spot. I sure as hell want to help put away anyone who’s got it coming, but I was still investigating the story and our series was still a week away from airing.

We had internal discussions about whether or not to even mention my personal situation and whether it was a conflict for me to continue.

My managers thought it was a fairly pointed way to demonstrate one of the central issues in our project … namely, that very bad things have happened to people who essentially played by the rules.

So they told me to go ahead and include my own experience in the report I was preparing about the gamesmanship of certain banks and service providers. They also felt it would be too much of a conflict for me to testify before a grand jury and to stay on the story, so I declined the invitation to testify (for now).

Knapp said he hopes to straighten out his problem. He does have title insurance, which could help.

It is a very weird spot to be in. This might be the most ambitious project our I-Team has ever taken on, and we’ve all been excited to work on something so far-reaching in our community, but I had no idea it would end up hitting so close to home…literally.

The lesson here is that people who played by the rules, bought homes from foreclosure sales and paid their bills may still lose their homes because of corrupted titles. Knapp bought his home three years ago and had no idea these problems were waiting for him in the files.