Home Snatching Tax Assessor Faces Supreme Court Smackdown After She Sold A Family’s House Illegally

A Michigan family took their tax dispute to court and won.

The judge ruled they didn't owe the money, but the local tax assessor had other plans.

What she said next just landed the case in front of nine Supreme Court justices who will decide whether government officials can ignore court rulings and seize your home anyway.

"I Don't Care What He Says"

Scott Pung bought his three-bedroom home in Union Township, Michigan, in 1991 and secured a property tax exemption that same year.

When Scott died in 2004, his widow stayed in the home until her death in 2008.

Their son Marc then moved in with his wife and children, and under Michigan law, the exemption continued automatically as long as family members lived there.

But in 2010, local tax assessor Patricia DePriest retroactively denied the exemption for 2007-2009, claiming the family needed to file new paperwork after Scott's death.

Scott's uncle Mike Pung—who was managing the estate—took the case to the Michigan Tax Tribunal.

The tribunal ruled in the Pungs' favor.

DePriest's response when asked about the judge's ruling?

"I don't care what he says."

She put the tax back on the books anyway and started foreclosure proceedings over roughly $1,600 the family legally didn't owe.

Here's How the Scam Actually Works

Isabella County seized the home in 2015 and auctioned it for $76,008—less than 40% of its assessed value of $200,000.

Now here's where you need to understand the mechanism behind the theft.

Tia Pung is a realtor, so she knows exactly what happened: "When they take a home and put it up for auction, they don't show interior photos or anything about the property."

Counties deliberately run these auctions like fire sales.

No marketing, no interior photos, no professional listing, minimal public notice.

They're not trying to maximize value because they don't want to maximize value.

The lower the auction price, the more equity they can claim doesn't exist.

"The people who go to these auctions are looking for an investment, and most of them are flippers," Tia explains.

The Pungs had already remodeled the kitchen and bathrooms.

The auction winner didn't lift a finger—just flipped it immediately for $195,000.

Made $120,000 in pure profit while the Pung family lost everything.

That $120,000 didn't vanish because the home wasn't worth it.

It vanished because the county designed the auction to undersell the property, then claimed the fire-sale price was just compensation.

This Could Happen to You Tomorrow

The Pungs never missed a tax payment.

They took their dispute to court and won.

A judge ruled they didn't owe the money.

And a local bureaucrat said "I don't care what he says" and took their house anyway.

One clerical error, one vindictive tax assessor, and you lose your home even after winning in court.

The county claimed the family owed $2,242 with interest and penalties—for a tax they were legally exempt from paying.

Isabella County kept the entire $76,008 initially, forcing Marc, his wife, and their young child out of the family home.

After the Pungs sued, federal courts ordered the county to return the surplus above the tax debt—about $73,000.

But that still left the family $118,000 short of what their home was actually worth.

Your county assessor has this same power right now.

What's Really at Stake When Justices Hear This Case

The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Pung v. Isabella County on February 25.

If the justices side with Isabella County, they're ruling that government officials can ignore court orders, seize property over debts you don't owe, and pocket the difference between fire-sale auctions and actual value.

Constitutional rights become suggestions that bureaucrats can override whenever they want.

The Pungs are arguing the Fifth Amendment requires just compensation based on fair market value when government takes property, not whatever rigged auction price the county engineers.

The Eighth Amendment bans excessive fines—destroying $118,000 in equity to collect $2,242 that was never owed is textbook excessive.

Isabella County's defense reveals everything: They claim that if they have to pay fair market value instead of auction prices, tax foreclosure becomes a money-losing proposition and nonviable as a means of tax collection.

Read that again.

They're admitting the system only works if they can keep the difference between what your home is worth and what they sell it for.

That's not tax collection—that's legalized theft with a government stamp on it.

Counties Built Their Budgets Around Stolen Equity

Detroit has an annual budget line for expected windfalls from home foreclosures.

They're not forecasting tax revenue—they're forecasting how much equity they'll steal from families.

Between 2020 and 2023, roughly 19,000 properties were foreclosed in Michigan.

Counties confiscated just under $40 million in surplus equity.

They returned $3.7 million to former owners.

That means they kept $36.3 million that belonged to Michigan families.

After the Michigan Supreme Court ruled in 2020 that keeping surplus equity was unconstitutional, the state legislature didn't fix the problem—they created a new system designed to fail.

Homeowners have to file notarized claims within 92 days of foreclosure to recover their equity.

But here's the trap: The 92 days often expire before the auction even happens, before any surplus exists to claim.

Faytima Howard lost her home in 2023 over $25,000 in taxes.

The county sold it at auction for nearly $500,000.

Howard should have gotten $475,000 back, but she missed the 92-day deadline.

The county kept all of it.

When no one successfully navigates your process, the problem isn't the people—it's that you designed the process to steal their money.

The Pattern Goes Back Decades

The Pung case mirrors Oakland County's 2014 seizure of Uri Rafaeli's rental property over an $8.41 tax debt.

The county sold it for $24,500 and pocketed everything.

In Tyler v. Hennepin County, Minnesota seized 94-year-old Geraldine Tyler's condo over $15,000 in unpaid taxes, sold it for $40,000, and kept the full amount.

The Supreme Court ruled unanimously in 2023 that this violated the Fifth Amendment.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that a taxpayer must render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, but no more.

But Michigan counties found the loophole: They return the surplus from the rigged auction, not the actual value of what they took.

It's like a thief stealing your $50,000 car, selling it to his buddy for $15,000, and claiming he gave you just compensation by handing over the $15,000.

Some Michigan officials have been caught auctioning foreclosed properties to family members and connected businesses at discount prices.

The equity doesn't disappear—it just goes to people with government connections instead of the families who built it.

Supreme Court Can End This Now

What the justices decide will determine whether government officials answer to the Constitution or whether they can rob you blind and dare you to sue them.

The Pung family never owed this money.

A judge confirmed they never owed it.

And they lost their home anyway because one bureaucrat decided court rulings don't apply to her.

If that can happen in Michigan, it can happen anywhere.

Your home equity isn't safe as long as counties can manufacture tax disputes, ignore court orders, and engineer fire-sale auctions that let them pocket the difference.

Nine justices will decide whether "I don't care what he says" is an acceptable response when government officials lose in court.

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Sources:

• Bob Unruh, "The Facts Should Shock the Country: Government Auctions Home Over Taxes That Were Not Due," WND News Center, February 12, 2026.
• Nolan Finley, "Michigan's theft of home equity faces Supreme Court challenge," The Detroit News, February 11, 2026.
• Terry Camp, "Mid-Michigan tax foreclosure case heads to U.S. Supreme Court," ABC12, February 16, 2026.
• Maxine McCullough, "Pung speaks out on Isabella County lawsuit as more details emerge," The Morning Sun, February 10, 2026.
• Christina Martin, "Michigan family fights for just compensation at the Supreme Court," Pacific Legal Foundation, January 2026.
• Kristine Parks, "Michigan family says county seized home over tax bill they didn't owe — case now heads to the Supreme Court," Fox News, January 2026.
• Katherine Dailey, "U.S. Supreme Court to decide if Michigan family is owed by county for house seized over tax bill," Michigan Advance, January 7, 2026.