Found cards in my name after husband's death

[Anonymous]

My husband passed away about a year ago. While going through his office, I found 3 CC's opened in my name  that I knew nothing about. He handled all of the finances, would not include me, and I had never looked at my credit report. Through lots of digging, I now know that he paid minimums on time on all of them. He used his own email, and I don't have passwords for anything. I think he was juggling cards to keep us afloat...idk what they were used for. On the advice of my probate attorney, I have not paid anything on these or communicated with the companies. My attorney has sent several letters. Capitol One dropped off my credit reports, and I no longer receive mail from them. But Citibank (9k) and Synchrony/Rakuten (3k) have charged off. I'm not sure where to go from here. I could pay them, but it would wipe out most of my safety net. The latest letter from Citibank asserts that the debt is valid because mail came to my address and payments were made. Suggestions?

[RobertEG]

The FCRA provides a procedure for blocking information from a consumer's credit report if the consumer is willing to file a police report asserting that the account was not authorized by them, and thus was the result of identity theft. The procedure does not require any consent, input, or contact with the creditors.  It only requires your willingness to put your assertion into the form of a police report.

See FCRA 605B, and the sticky post in the upper portion of the General Credit Topics forum for details on use of this so-called Identity Theft Process. 

Using that procedure, you can simply obtain a police report making the assertion, and send it to the CRA.  That will then block any information related to that account from your credit report, thus making sure it does not impact your credit score.

[Anonymous]

I would honestly file a police report and send it in to the creditors and bureaus and they will remove the accounts and debts. Since he's passed away you won't have to worry about getting him in trouble and it will avoid you from having to take the hit from not paying the debts and having them be on your credit. It should be a pretty easy process and straight forward. Just say you did not authorize them to be opened and had no prior knowledge of them or access to the accounts / cards. 

[GApeachy]

Since you have an attorney, have him send the police reports (if you file).  Let your attorney handle/instruct you about everything.  Condlence 

[Red1Blue]

Sorry to hear about your problems. Sorry for your loss.