A former worker at a Merrillville law office has been arrested on 45 charges in an alleged fraud scheme involving fake court documents and client payments.
Heather Ann Textor faces five Level 5 felony fraud counts, 37 Level 6 felony counts and three Class A misdemeanor counts, according to court documents reported by FOX 32. The charges are allegations and have not been proven in court.
Textor worked as a legal secretary at the Law Office of Weiss, Schmidgall and Hires. Prosecutors accuse her of taking money from clients while falsely claiming she was handling expungements, driver's license matters and other legal services.
Investigators say some clients received fake expungement orders and other documents that appeared to carry judges' signatures, and that those documents were not filed with the courts. The charges also allege she forged bond assignment forms and used a law firm check to refund one client without authorization.
In one example cited in the probable cause affidavit, a client paid $1,626 for an expungement; the firm's records showed $626 deposited, while the remaining $1,000 could not be found in its accounting. The affidavit says the investigation began after a client brought suspected fraudulent documents to Indiana State Police, and that the firm fired Textor in November 2023 after reviewing receipt books and finding additional payments that allegedly were not deposited.
