9NEWS INVESTIGATES: Owners of troubled Aurora apartments allege insurance fraud caused them to lose insurance coverage

AURORA, Colo. — Days after President-elect Donald Trump suggested during a campaign stop in Aurora that, “multiple apartment complexes have been taken over by the savage Venezuelan prison gang known as Tren de Aragua,” an attorney representing the owners of those apartments, approached the city with a variation of that theory and a request for help.

A previous property manager “may have engaged in significant insurance fraud,” according to an Oct. 15, 2024, email 9NEWS Investigates obtained through an open records request. “As a direct result of [his] fraudulent conduct, our insurance carrier has terminated their coverage for the Properties.” The email is from Denver attorney Walter Slatkin to Aurora City Attorney Pete Schulte.

“We are requesting the City’s assistance in our endeavor to file criminal charges against [the former property manager],” Slatkin added.

The former property manager, fired by the owners, CBZ Management, in either late 2023 or early 2024, has not been charged with anything as of Friday. 9NEWS has subsequently elected not to use his name.

Slatkin’s email also offered a potentially noteworthy claim about the former property manager. “We have been informed that he is also a member of the Tren de Aragua gang.”  The email did not offer evidence as it suggested he “has been involved in facilitating the presence of lethal weapons at the Properties.”

It remains unclear what kind of insurance fraud might have taken place. A spokesperson for Aurora Police would only say a detective has been assigned to the case, adding the detective has not yet heard back from Slatkin about the claim.

The email to Schulte arrived four days after President-elect Trump told a crowd in Aurora that the city had become the subject of a “full-blown invasion.”

9NEWS Investigates has reached out to Slatkin and will update this story if we hear back.

Other documents obtained by 9NEWS Investigates provide additional context to the story that has generated national headlines.

For example, on June 26 of this year, Slatkin told the city that the now-shuttered 1568 Nome Street property “does have a manager and continued maintenance.”

The following day, the tone shifted. “The owners were informed that [their] properties had been forcibly taken over” by “gangs,” wrote Slatkin.

On July 9, the owners confirmed to the city that all three of their Aurora properties were up for sale, but added, “marketing has been suspended until law enforcement restores us to control.”

On July 29, the city attorney’s office appeared unmoved as it readied to prosecute the owners for continued maintenance problems. Plead guilty to two counts of owning a “public nuisance,” and the city will offer the landlord “60 days jail up front.”

The offer never went through, and within days, the property owners hired a Florida-based public relations firm to help it share the gang takeover story with the national and local news.

The story blew up from there.

If you have any information on this story you’d like to share with us, please email us at Chris.vanderveen@9news.com