NYC duo takes over dying widow’s house while she is on hospice, but snail mail letter exposes scheme: officials

A scheming duo took over a dying elderly woman’s Queens home while she was on hospice care — but her family uncovered the fraud with a congratulatory piece of mail, officials said Thursday.

Deepa Roy, 68, and Victor Quimis, 39, forged Renuka Bherwani’s signature to “steal” the Kew Gardens Hills house she had lived in for 40 years without paying a cent, according to the New York Attorney General’s Office and a criminal indictment.

The heartless pair made a phony deed on Oct. 13, 2024 while Bherwani was on hospice and suffering from dementia, before she died of old age in June of this year, according to officials and her family.

“I was angered beyond belief because I was dealing with the sadness of imminently losing my mother and at the same time dealing with fraudsters who were trying to steal from her,” her son Kamal Bherwani, 56, told The Post by phone.

His mother had moved into the house in 1986 with her late husband, Mohan Bherwani, the AG’s office said.

Quimis, a Queens resident, pleaded not guilty in Queens Supreme Court to charges of grand larceny, mortgage fraud, money laundering and related crimes. He was released without bail Monday, court records show. Roy — a Manhattan resident — is on the lam, officials said.

“Deepa Roy and Victor Quimis preyed on an elderly widow in hospice to steal the home she owned for nearly 40 years,” AG Letitia James said in a statement.

The pair are the first to be prosecuted under a new deed theft law spearheaded by James — which makes deed theft a crime and allows the AG to prosecute such cases.

Roy first worked her way into Renuka Bherwani’s life in 2022 when she started visiting the home, telling the ailing woman’s health aides that she was her friend, the AG said.

And in the summer of 2024, Roy tried to convince the health aides to allow Roy to move into one of the spare bedrooms in the home but her son and his wife stepped in to block Roy’s brazen request, James’ office said.

Kamal Bherwani — who was an executive in the administrations for former Mayors Michael Bloomberg and Rudy Giuliani — said he never met Roy, but she had “worked her way into some sort of relationship with my mom.”

Roy and Quimis took over the house two years later by forging Bherwani’s signature, and they also forged the signature of a Nassau County notary sing the wrong date on the document, the AG said.

The accused scammers committed mortgage fraud two months later by transferring the home from their names to Quimis’ company, Hunter Studios & Developer Corp. — then forged the notary’s signature another time, the AG alleges.

The duo then took out a $552,500 mortgage on the home to pay off the prior mortgage and liens and pocketed the remaining $312,000, according to James’ office.

Quimis laundered the funds through his company’s bank accounts and used it for personal expenses, the AG claimed.

Quimis paid Roy $15,000 for the long con, writing her a check with the memo line saying:
“Per agreement,” James’ said.

“They thought carefully and planned carefully on how to defraud my mom,” Kamal said.

Kamal Bherwani said at the time his mother’s signature was forged, she couldn’t turn herself in bed, go to the bathroom or feed herself — much less hold a pen to sign documents.

The son and his wife — who had power of attorney over the family matriarch — caught on to the scheme in December when they found a letter to Quimis from the city’s Department of Environmental Protection, which handles water and sewage bills.

The letter congratulated Quimis for becoming a “new owner” and gave instructions for how to make an online account for paying bills, the family said. The concerned duo, brought the suspected fraud to the AG’s office.

Roy and Quimis face a maximum of between eight to 25 years behind bars if convicted of the top charge.

Quimis’ criminal defense lawyer didn’t immediately return a request for comment Thursday. It was not immediately known if Roy had legal representation. She did not immediately return a message seeking comment.

Kamal Bherwani went public last year about his son Ethan’s tragic fentanyl overdose death. The dad blamed Mohegan Sun for wasting time after Ethan lost consciousness and fell out of a chair while playing blackjack at the casino to celebrate his college graduation.

Video showed pit bosses and dealers carrying on dealing cards, while the son lay motionless on the floor in the May 18, 2021 incident. Jerrard Santiago was sentenced to eight years behind bars in September for dealing the drugs that killed Ethan.