NEW HOPE: Many conned by ‘rich widow’

By Linda Seida, Staff Writer
   NEW HOPE — New Hope police have filed charges against a scam artist who conned locals out of thousands of dollars in jewelry and millions of dollars in real estate by portraying herself as a rich widow, only to have her scheme disintegrate when her checks began to bounce.
   But local authorities will have to wait to get a crack at prosecuting her. She’s already in custody in Monmouth County, N.J., for pulling a similar routine, according to police.
   ”She just has to make the circuit right now,” New Hope police Chief Michael Cummings said. “Three states are involved and four jurisdictions as far as we know.”
   New Hope police charged Nydia Neubauer, 63, with theft by deception, receiving stolen property, identity theft, writing bad checks and forgery.
   She came to town with a story, she was likeable, and people believed her. She said she was the widow of a very wealthy man and was awaiting millions to be released from his estate.
   ”She said the money was tied up in probate,” Chief Cummings said. “Everybody was saying this was the real deal; she was good for the money.”
   Chief Cummings said she made herself a part of the community, going out daily and walking her dogs along borough streets.
   ”She was going to build in New Hope,” he said.
   According to the charges filed by police, Ms. Neubauer gave rubber checks to local developer George Michael, a local real estate salesperson, Lambertville jeweler Dimitri Politicos, Zikos Jewelers in New Hope and Ernesto Guerrera of El Mariachi, also in New Hope.
   According to police, she wrote a number of checks to Mr. Michael: $2,000 toward a real estate purchase; $85,500, also for real estate; $319.79 for “household sundries;” and $18,750, for rent on a property she occupied on West Mechanic Street.
   Police said she also wrote a check for more than $1 million as settlement for a real estate purchase.
   Police said she passed a bad check for $5.38 million to a real estate salesperson in an agreement of sale for a Philadelphia property.
   She passed a bad check to Mr. Politicos for jewelry in the amount of $44,965, and three more bad checks went to Zikos Jewelers for $59,345, $42,589 and $7,844, according to police.
   She allegedly wrote three bad checks to El Mariachi, totaling $27,500.
   All of the checks were returned, unpaid.
   The identity theft and forgery charges stem from her use of aliases and social security numbers that were not her own. The name Lucy Luz George is among the aliases she used, according to police.