A man has shared a warning after a £1.2 million house was built on his land without his permission.
Dr. Daniel Kenigsberg was just one year old when his parents bought a house on Sky Top Terrace, Fairfield, Connecticut, which then became his childhood home.
In 1991, he bought a half-acre plot of land next door to the home in the hopes of passing it onto his family one day.
Dr. Kenigsberg has held on to the land ever since, declining previous offers of up to $400,000 (£314,000) to buy it.
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However, the land still ended up being ‘sold’ in October 2022 to Sky Top Partners LLC for $350,000 (£275,000) due to a scam where someone had impersonated the owner.
Construction began on the land without Kenigsberg even knowing it and he had no idea that anything was going on until he received a phone call from a friend.
"I said, 'I own that and I never sold it.' I was shocked," he told Greenwich Time.
Now, as it's been revealed that the $1.45 million (£1.2 million) pound home that had been built on the land has been sold following a reported settlement, Dr. Kenigsberg has shared a stark warning.
He told CT Insider: "If you live in California and you have land in Vermont, you’d better have somebody keeping an eye on it."
Terms of the settlement haven’t been disclosed, but Dr. Keninsburg has reportedly received compensation.
The fraud case was first investigated by Fairfield’s police department, which later handed it over to the FBI but it is still reportedly unsolved.
"I’d have to say it’s a case of mixed emotions," Kenigsberg said. "I think that in the final analysis the judicial system was good as exemplified by Federal Magistrate Specter."
He added: "I have very profound concerns about the diligence of law enforcement.
"At least to my knowledge the perpetrator has not been found, has not been stopped and therefore is most likely preying on other people."
Consumer protection lawyer Kevin Kneupper suggests claims of fraud aren’t particularly outlandish as it’s rather simple to pose as a landowner.
"It's really easy to go find who owns land. In many places, you just search online, they'll have databases, so they could find out real easily who's the actual owner and then just pretend to be him." he said.
"Now, to be clear, his attorney and Mr. Kenigsberg, they are not accusing the people who bought it of being involved. They think that they sort of didn't know what was going on, and that someone in South Africa did this.
"And that's who the police are trying to go after to find where the money actually went to when they paid for it."
LADbible has contacted Sky Top Partners LLC for comment.
Bec Oakes