Overview
- Cheryl Jefferson, 63, was arrested on a Flagler County fugitive warrant, charged with an organized scheme to defraud over $50,000, booked at Walton County Jail, and released on a $100,000 bond.
- Deputies say she posed as the seller of other people’s properties, used a driver’s license photo that matched her, and moved $421,995.30 from sales into a bank account before sending the money to a Coinbase account and on to accounts tied to men in Nigeria.
- Flagler investigators linked related cases across jurisdictions, including two in Lee County, one in Greene County, Georgia, and a civil case in Pueblo County, Colorado, with help from a real-time crime center and cellphone evidence naming a contact as “Chase Rice.”
- The probe began in January 2024 when a Palm Coast owner learned she could not pay taxes because the title had changed, and in April 2024 a relative found a house built on a lot that had been sold without the true owner’s consent.
- Authorities are seeking more victims and urge owners to check county Property Appraiser records, noting prosecutors are reviewing financial and phone data and that more reports could expand the multi-state investigation.