Empire State Building quickly changes hands as New York Daily News "steals" it

Utilizing a bit of humorous slight-of-hand, the Daily News has successfully conducted a heist of one of our nation's most iconic buildings. The Daily News, by easily passing a few forged documents, liberated the Empire State Building from its rightful owners. This "theft" was done in an exercise designed to highlight a gaping bureaucratic loophole through which crooks can extract deeds to the real estate properties of others.

The good news is, the Daily News has given the building back.

The loophole, which was exposed through this courthouse gambit, involves administrative employees who are allowed to process real estate transfers without verifying information contained in the required documents.

The Daily News gave this report: "Less than 90 minutes after the bogus documents were submitted on Monday, the agency rubber-stamped the transfer from Empire State Land Associates to (a dummy company)." The article goes on to expose several examples wherein real estate deeds have easily been extracted through the exploitation of a less than thorough process.