I honestly never heard of this but Google's John Mueller told someone that they do not need to worry that Google will consider new URLs that are close to the same URL name as an old URL to transfer signals from the old URL to the new URL.
For example, you have a page with a lot of bad links at www.domain.com/my-bad-links-url.html and you decide to 404 that page and make a new page with similar content and similar URL at www.domain.com/my-bad-link-url.html (notice one change in the URL name). John Mueller said you don't have to worry about the signals passing if you 404ed the other URL and don't 301 it to the new URL.
He said this in a Google Webmaster Help thread:
If you just remove the old pages, and add new ones -- even if the URLs look similar -- then Google won't be able to forward any of the signals from the old pages to the new ones, and will treat the new ones like any other new page on your site.
Google's John Mueller also said in the past that penalties might follow you to a new domain even if you do not redirect it from the old to the new.
Forum discussion at Google Webmaster Help.
