patrick.net
An Antidote to Corporate Media
1,365,058 comments by 15,735 users - Ceffer, Misc, Patrick, preed, TheAntiPanicanLearingCenter online now
'Landlords from hell' deal includes prison time, for real estate agent
2013 Jun 21, 1:43am 1,911 views 15 comments
by zzyzzx follow (9)
Comments 1 - 15 of 15 Search these comments
zzyzzx
@
2013 Jun 21, 1:44am
I'm wondering how this could possibly happen, since all the renters there presumably had leases that they could simply not renew.
zzyzzx
@
2013 Jun 21, 1:50am
http://www.sfgate.com/default/article/Bizarre-account-of-S-F-eviction-battle-3285947.php#page-1
Last week, the Macys' alleged tactics landed them in criminal court. Kip Macy, a 33-year-old software developer who has developed anti-hacking programs, and Nicole Macy, 32, a real estate agent whose office is in the Sunset District, were both charged with multiple felony counts of burglary, theft, conspiracy and stalking. They declined to be interviewed for this story.
New Renter
@
2013 Jun 21, 5:31am
The fact the threats were made via email shows these people are not only stupid but amateurs. Or under the influence.
New Renter
@
2013 Jun 21, 5:38am
Macys kicked in his door and threw his belongings, including many paintings he created himself, into the garbage.
If a landlord kicks in your door like that they are begging, no pleading to be shot dead in self defense. Since both landlords would then be out of the picture would the victim then be able to sue the estate for damages + the cost of the bullets and be awarded the property as compensation?
I'm wondering how this could possibly happen, since all the renters there presumably had leases that they could simply not renew.
Are you saying the tenants could have gotten out of the situation if they wanted to? Absolutely...are you saying the landlords could have just declined to renew the leases? NOPE! Not if it's a rent controlled apartment. As I understand it, it's really hard to remove a tenant from a rent controlled apartment. I guess you could bribe them with cash...
I do think there is a provision for "renovations" whereby you can vacate the entire property and keep it off the market for some amount of time (8 months? A year?) ostensibly while you do renovations...and then you can re-market it. That's my basic understanding. Why they didn't take this tack...
New Renter
@
2013 Jun 21, 9:46am
I do think there is a provision for "renovations" whereby you can vacate the entire property and keep it off the market for some amount of time (8 months? A year?) ostensibly while you do renovations...and then you can re-market it. That's my basic understanding. Why they didn't take this tack...
Given the actions of the landlords as described in the article I doubt they put much thought into LEGAL options. It sounds like they got their tactics from reality shows.
New Renter
@
2013 Jun 21, 10:00am
APOCALYPSEFUCK is Shostakovich says
The fact the threats were made via email shows these people are not only stupid but amateurs. Or under the influence.
Right on. Professional investors would have just lit fires on the stairways and had a sniper team ready to deliver head shots when the renters ran into the street. A carton of cigarettes would have provided a report from the building inspector indicating the fire was caused by an electrical accident. The cops just would have been happy to have bodies to rifle for gold fillings and cash.
Right:
1) Increase the fire insurance over 400%
2) Loot the building of small valuables and secure larger ones in a fireproof container. (try NOT to be seen).
Then comes the fire - a large fire which one way or another makes the renter problem go away.
3) Proclaim innocence but settle with insurance company for whatever can be negotiated despite suspicions of investigators. (A few cartons of cigarettes should alleviate those suspicions)
Run and win public office.
Snipers are a bit overkill - instead disguise assassins as rescue workers with fake ambulances. Renters are taken away without suspicion and dumped at sea - after being shaken down for gold fillings and cash.
zzyzzx
@
2013 Jun 21, 10:59pm
Are you saying the tenants could have gotten out of the situation if they wanted to? Absolutely...are you saying the landlords could have just declined to renew the leases? NOPE! Not if it's a rent controlled apartment. As I understand it, it's really hard to remove a tenant from a rent controlled apartment. I guess you could bribe them with cash...
You mean that all leases in that area are automatically self renewing, even if, as a landlord, you don't want it to?
I was also thinking that the one holdout could have been paid to leave.
Tenpoundbass
@
2013 Jun 22, 1:34am
The fact the threats were made via email shows these people are not only stupid but amateurs.
Buying property to rent out, makes some people think they are above the law. Because 90% of renters don't know their rights, 90% of landlords violate State renter laws. And the tenants let them get away with it. So it's a short step for a landlord to punch a tenant in the face for insulting the landlords choice of landscaping plants.
Some of the most out of touch people I ever met were landlords.
New Renter
@
2013 Jun 22, 4:34am
APOCALYPSEFUCK is Shostakovich says
Snipers are a bit overkill - instead disguise assassins as rescue workers with fake ambulances. Renters are taken away without suspicion and dumped at sea - after being shaken down for gold fillings and cash.
Nice. But real landlords would enjoy tearing through the renters with Gatling guns and sodomizing the bodies.
Well of course! Dumping live renters at sea would be cruel. Death by Gatling gun is a kindness.
New Renter
@
2013 Jun 22, 7:17am
APOCALYPSEFUCK is Shostakovich says
Death by Gatling gun is a kindness.
Any jury would agree much better than they deserve.
If the job is done right there is no suspicion of wrongdoing, no arrests and no trial.
Granted IF there was a trial a mass execution by Gatling gun would be viewed favorably by a jury - as long as the jury is stacked with realtor landlords.
curious2
@
2013 Sep 9, 3:38pm
My question: how did a realtor who looks like Nicole find a husband who looks like Kip? Granted, he doesn't seem to be the brightest bulb on the tree, but is he blind too? She could have scared the tenants away just by hanging around the building.
New Renter
@
2013 Sep 9, 11:42pm
APOCALYPSEFUCK is Comptroller says
Snipers are a bit overkill - instead disguise assassins as rescue workers with fake ambulances. Renters are taken away without suspicion and dumped at sea - after being shaken down for gold fillings and cash.
You are an artiste.
Danke schön!
Comments 1 - 15 of 15 Search these comments
http://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/Landlords-from-hell-deal-includes-prison-time-4610530.php#photo-4809127
Two San Francisco property owners dubbed "landlords from hell" for making their tenants' lives unbearable before fleeing to Italy and hiding out for two years have been convicted of a raft of crimes in the case and will do state prison time, authorities announced Wednesday.
Kip Macy, 38, and Nicole Macy, 37, pleaded guilty this week to residential burglary, attempted grand theft and stalking in connection with a bizarre two-year campaign to get five of their tenants to move out of their South of Market building, said District Attorney George Gascón.
Under a plea agreement, they are to be sentenced in August to four years and four months behind bars, Gascón said. Until then, they are in County Jail on $2 million bail each.
Authorities say the Macys tried to force their tenants out by making their property at 744-746 Clementina St. practically uninhabitable from 2005 to 2007. Among their actions were threatening the tenants, stealing their belongings, changing locks, cutting telephone lines and shutting off gas and power.
At one point, the Macys doused the victims' beds, clothes and electronics in ammonia, authorities said. They also directed workers to board over windows while the tenants were still inside, cut out sections of support beams under the building to make them vulnerable to collapsing, and sawed holes through the floors.
"This is obviously an extreme case of landlords just going out of the way to get some tenants out of the building," Gascón said. "There were some financial motivations there - they wanted to get the building cleared up and they wanted to resell the building, but that's not the way to do it.
"There are legal means to do that, and we want to make sure people understand that there will be severe consequences when you violate the law to this level."
One of the victims in the case, 50-year-old Ricardo Cartagena, on Wednesday described his ordeal with the couple as frightening and exasperating.
Cartagena was a live-in building manager for six months in 2006 at the height of the Macys' harassment, and said they repeatedly changed the main gate lock to keep tenants out of their homes.
"It was kind of a game," he said. "Every day, they changed the lock and I had to open it for the tenants."
Cartagena said that at one point, Kip Macy told him he had a gun and would shoot him if he saw him outside the building. Soon after that, he said, the Macys kicked in his door and threw his belongings, including many paintings he created himself, into the garbage.
When civil attorneys got involved in the overall case, Nicole Macy impersonated one of the victims with an e-mail and curtly fired his lawyer, prosecutors said. Then, still impersonating the victim by e-mail, she threatened to kidnap and dismember the children of one of her own attorneys.
"One day you are going to come home ... and find (your three children) missing," she e-mailed, according to the grand jury transcript. "Then each day a package will arrive with a piece of them. You are f- with the wrong person."
The Macys were charged in 2008 and released on $250,000 bail each, but then failed to show up for trial in 2010 and fled to Italy.
Italian authorities detained them in 2011, and they were taken into custody by the Bureau of Diplomatic Security for extradition, which they fought for a year before being extradited to San Francisco last month.
#housing