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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- A new company has paid off delinquent taxes on 16 properties -- without the owners' authorization -- and now is making claims to some of the properties.
Utah attorney general and Salt Lake County district attorney investigators are making preliminary inquiries into the plan by Wideye Investments, a Salt Lake City-based investment company that registered with the state in March.
The company paid off nearly $358,000 worth of unpaid taxes for the 16 parcels in Salt Lake County.
The properties, a mixture of residential and business parcels, were scheduled for auction at the county's May 25 tax sale.
Property owners had up until that date to pay off the taxes that had gone unpaid for nearly five years.
"We're doing everything within the law, and it's they who haven't paid their taxes in five years," said Wideye Investments owner Michael Memmott Jr.
Wideye paid off the taxes on the 16 parcels within the past two weeks and received tax-redemption certificates. The notes state the taxes have been paid but that does not give the company ownership of the properties, and the property owners do not owe Wideye anything, county officials said.
The company wants to take on the county's role as debt collector and charge a statutory annual interest rate on the unpaid property taxes.
"I don't understand their theory that they get to collect the tax and charge interest," said Mary Ellen Sloan, a deputy district attorney. "There is nothing that I know in Utah law that permits them to step into the taxing-entity position."
Assistant Attorney General Scott Reed said that the property owners indeed owe Wideye nothing.
Memmott and his attorney disagree, saying the law is unclear, and the company wants to use the $358,000 investment as a test case of Utah law.
The company has filed 11 public notices of litigation with the county recorder's office. The notices said Wideye planned on filing a "quiet title action" against the property owners. Wideye wants to use this as a tool to acquire ownership of the properties.
All of the notices were filed for commercial properties, not homes. To date, two of the notices have been withdrawn.
"We're not trying to do anything illegal, we're just trying to see what the law will allow," said D. Scott Berrett, the company's lawyer. "If the law doesn't allow it, we'll back off, lick our wounds and find the next adventure we're into."
A 63-year-old Magna woman feared the worst when she found out Wideye had paid off her property taxes.
"Whoever this company is, they put their nose where they don't belong," said the woman, who asked the Deseret Morning News not to use her name. "It's scaring us to death. We are petrified we are going to lose our home."
The woman had been granted a tax deferral and abatement by the county to eventually pay off $3,188.27 in property-tax debt.
Berrett said the company will arrange a way for the woman to pay back her taxes, just like the county did. And if that won't work, "We'll just eat the costs," Berrett said.
"Our intent is not to take away their home from them," Memmott said. "Whatever agreements we have with them, we'll honor."
Anyone who wants to pay off their taxes is welcome to reimburse the company, Memmott said.
(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
