With the spoils, officials said, Ms. Albertina had apparently built a $2 million mansion on Long Island and bought a 34-foot yacht called Miei Tre Bambinis, which was on display outside the news conference announcing her indictment. There, Mr. Gillings told reporters that he was heartbroken because the only house he had ever owned had been stolen from him.

Ms. Albertina, who was represented by the well-known lawyer Benjamin Brafman, was released on $1 million bail. Eighteen months later she was back in court, charged again with stealing houses in Brooklyn. She pleaded guilty to grand larceny in 2006, but the start of her sentence was delayed with the understanding that she would pay restitution of $2 million. Prosecutors said, however, that she then participated in a $100 million mortgage fraud scheme, in Manhattan. In January 2009, a judge called Ms. Albertina’s conduct “extreme and egregious” and sentenced her to 5 to 15 years in prison.

Deed theft and mortgage fraud schemes are notoriously difficult and costly to unravel. The United States attorney’s office in Brooklyn and the Brooklyn district attorney’s office have created units to deal specifically with fraudulent real estate schemes. But as the house on Strauss Street shows, even a successful prosecution does not guarantee that a victim can go home again.

“Securing the return of stolen real property is one of the more difficult things to do,” said Richard Farrell, the head of the real estate fraud unit at the Brooklyn district attorney’s office. “The book is not closed on this office helping Mr. Gillings.”

While Ms. Albertina traveled through the court system, the brick house on Strauss Street became blighted. Warped plywood replaced windowpanes, and an unlocked metal gate covered the broken front door. Thieves plundered the premises, Mr. Gillings said, and workers hired by fraudulent owners threw out many of the artworks that he had kept there. They also removed interior walls, he said, further weakening an already fragile frame.

At one point a heap of rubbish outside the facade ignited, singeing the siding. In 2007, a 22-year-old man was fatally shot in the head while sitting on the stoop.