Transgender Drama Seeps into Courtroom

HOUSTON - Nikki Araguz can get very dramatic. She considers herself the widow of fallen firefighter Thomas Araguz.

He was killed on the job fighting a fire, but before he died Araguz learned his wife was born a man.

Araguz's mother is attempting to void the marriage to block Nikki from collecting her son's death benefits.

"My husband, Thomas Araguz. I have been completely honest with him," Araguz says.

Some simply don't believe that.

Nikki Araguz's very existence by her own admission has been in some cases to deceive men.

This is Nikki 15 years ago during an interview for a student film project.

"Sometimes I tell them when I meet them. Sometimes they've seen me on TV. Sometimes I just don't tell them," she said.

Thomas Araguz's sister says Nikki deceived her brother after a sex change.

"He was embarrassed, he was ashamed that he had brought this person into our family," Raquel Araguz says.

Chad Ellis represents the Araguz family.

"Nikki Araguz is someone who has conned people her entire life we're getting daily reports that Thomas Araguz was not the first person this happened to," he says.

Araguz cried on the stand last Friday at a hearing in Wharton. She was described as unbelievable by Raquel Araguz.

Just how important is believability in this case?

Legal analyst Chris Tritico says this could come down to two things: if the court doesn't recognize Nikki as the wife under Texas law and did Thomas Araguz indicate she was the beneficiary for life insurance?

"In contract law she still takes the money regardless or not if she is a man or a woman at the time they were married. Now conversely, what the family is going to say, is he thought he married a woman and she defrauded him," Tritico says.

This case still remains in court. If the judge sides with Nikki she gets 50 percent of Araguz's benefits - if not 100 percent will go to his biological sons.