Harris County is suing over stolen deeds again. Last time 40 homes came back and nobody was charged.

Harris County Attorney Abbie Kamin filed two civil lawsuits over allegedly forged deeds on September 9. It is at least the third round of the same suit since April 2025, her office’s own announcement names neither the court nor a cause number, and in the one case that has reached judgment the homes came back and nobody was criminally charged.

Why it matters

A forged deed is not a paperwork problem. It moves the title to a house out of a family’s name in the public record, and the family usually finds out late, from a tax notice or a stranger at the door. Getting it back takes a lawsuit the homeowner did not file and could not afford alone. The county attorney’s office has now brought that suit three times. What the record does not show is anything that stops the next filing.

By the numbers

Two lawsuits announced September 9, 2026, styled Harris County vs. Antia Martinez et al and Harris County vs. Mario Cavazos, per the county attorney’s own release.
Five properties in the Martinez case and five in the Cavazos case, 10 in all, per that release. It states no number of defendants and no number of families.
1992, the year one of the owners whose deed was allegedly forged died, per the release.
40 properties ordered returned by default judgment in August 2025, after the defendant did not appear, per ABC13.
0 criminal charges against those defendants. ABC13 reported on August 6, 2025 that neither “has ever faced criminal charges in these cases.”
At least 35 properties named in the April 2025 suit, which sought more than $1 million in damages, per ABC13.
$250,000 maximum civil penalty per violation with an elderly victim, $10,000 otherwise, per KPRC 2.
3 people have held the county attorney’s office since the first suit: Christian Menefee, interim Jonathan Fombonne, and Kamin, whose term began June 15, 2026.

What the coverage buried

ABC13 opened on one family, Keata Wade and her grandmother’s house on Teton Street. That is the right way to open it. What the story leaves out is ABC13’s own archive: the April 2025 suit over at least 35 properties, the May 2025 Trinity Gardens suit reported by KPRC 2, and the August 2025 default judgment that returned 40 homes. A reader would take the September filing for a first move. It is not.

It also drops the line ABC13 published in August 2025, that no defendant in the 40 property case had faced a criminal charge and that it was unclear whether the district attorney would take the cases to a grand jury. Thirteen months later, the September 9 story does not return to it.

The county’s own release has a gap of its own. It announces the two suits by case style and gives neither the court nor a cause number, so a resident who wants to read the petitions cannot get there from the announcement. No later release from the office has added them. This desk could not obtain them either. The Harris County District Clerk’s public records search now requires a registered login.

The other side

The civil route is the fast one, and the county attorney has no charging power. A civil suit can clear a title in months. A criminal case needs a grand jury, proof beyond a reasonable doubt and years, and it does not by itself return a house. Kamin is using the tool she has, and the August judgment shows it works.

The release also asks homeowners who suspect a fraudulent filing to contact the office, which is how one of these gets caught early rather than at the tax notice.

That concession holds only as far as it goes. A judgment after the fact did not stop the next round of filings, which is why there is a next round. Someone with charging power has to do the other half. Across four news stories from two outlets since April 2025, plus the county’s own release, the district attorney’s office has not been put on the record about whether that is happening.

What to watch

Whether the county attorney’s office publishes the court and a cause number for either suit. Neither appears in the announcement or in any release since.
Whether the district attorney’s office says anything about a grand jury.
Whether the new defendants answer, or the county takes another default judgment against people who never show up.
Whether anything changes at the recording desk. Nothing published explains what stops the next forged deed from being filed and accepted.

Bottom line

The county attorney’s office is good at getting houses back. Nothing in the public record shows anyone is good at stopping the theft. A remedy that only runs after the fact is a discount on trying it again. The number worth watching is not the ten houses. It is whether the criminal charge count ever moves off zero.

Sources

Editorial