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Authors: Eric Dinnocenzo

Tags: #Mystery: Legal Thriller - Legal Services - Massachusetts

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BOOK: Eric Dinnocenzo - The Tenant Lawyer
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I changed into more comfortable clothing, a pair of blue cotton lounging pants and a long-sleeve shirt, and sat down next to her on the couch. She had on comfortable clothes too: a pair of red cotton sleeping pants and a light blue, long-sleeved shirt with drawings of seashells in the front. It was an outfit she wore a lot inside the apartment that I affectionately referred to as red pants and seashell shirt. She was watching “Sex and the City,” one of her favorite programs. In a slightly cool tone, she asked me how my day had gone, and I told her about my morning in housing court. She seemed to genuinely feel bad for Kendra. She also gave me some perspective on Maria Roman, telling me that she probably had lived a tough life and had acted as she did as a defense mechanism.

A few moments passed in which we didn’t say anything and then I told her, “I’m sorry we fought last night.”

“I’m sorry, too.”

“You had trouble sleeping, didn’t you?”

“Yeah, I hardly slept. I’ve been really tired today.”

“I’m sorry. I had trouble sleeping too.”

“You did?” she asked incredulously. “You never have trouble.”

I shrugged. By making an apology, I felt I had cleared the air between us, at least somewhat. More could have been said, of course. Typically, I would’ve proceeded to review the argument with her as if I were football analyst going over an instant replay, unearthing the cause of it and trying to find a remedy. But it just didn’t seem right this time. After a few moments passed, she proceeded to tell me about her day. Only a couple of people had come into the real estate office, and they had gone to look at apartments with other agents. It was dispiriting to her to sit there all day and have nothing happen. The owner of the office, Jeff, was caught up in a crusade to get a Republican appointed to the Boston City Council. Jeff came from old money and his father had set him up in the business, but he was uninterested in real estate. Instead he seemed intent on stirring up the political waters in the Beacon Hill neighborhood as a frustrated Republican in a liberal enclave. Not infrequently, he wrote letters to the editor of the
Beacon Hill Times
that were full of vitriol, not to mention a little wacky, though they were well-written from a technical perspective. His right-wing politics annoyed Sara and he often goaded her into debates that only left her frustrated.

“He’s just so thick,” she said. “He blames the Democrats for everything, even the problems with the Big Dig. And I’m not much better since I engage him in these arguments. Afterwards, I ask myself, why do I even bother?”

I chuckled. “That’s a good question. You’ll never change him.”

“I know,” she said, shaking her head.

“Hey, I know I’m changing the subject, but what do you want to do for dinner?”

“I’m not really hungry.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah.”

“I was thinking we could order some food together. Like a pizza or something.”

“You can order for yourself, but I’m not going to have any.”

“Sometimes you get hungry later at night, though.”

“I’m not hungry
now
,” she responded, a hint of a smile appearing on her face.

“Okay.”

There was only one good pizza place near our apartment—Boston was horribly lacking when it came to good pizza—but it didn’t deliver, so I called up one of the crappy ones that did, and ordered a small sausage with roasted red peppers. While waiting for the food to arrive, I sat on the couch reading
The Boston Globe
.
After “Sex and the City” was over, Sara began watching “Will & Grace,” another show that I had no interest in. When the pizza arrived I had no choice but to watch the program as I ate. We didn’t have a kitchen table, so we took all of our meals at the
coffee table while sitting on the living room couch. During a commercial break, I picked up the remote control and asked Sara if I could scroll through the guide.

“I guess so,” she replied, obviously not thrilled by the idea.

I flipped through it and saw that
A Few Good Men
was on. “So, you want to watch ‘Will & Grace,’ huh?” I asked a little sheepishly.

“Yes, I do.”

“So that means you don’t want to watch
A Few Good Men
?”

“That’s exactly what it means.” She shook her head while wearing a slightly amused smile.

After a few minutes passed, I noticed that she was eyeing my pizza. “That looks good,” she remarked.

“It’s okay. You know how the pizza places are around here.”

“I just got hungry.”

I pointed at her playfully. “See, I knew you would.”

I took a bite of pizza while she sat there looking at me. I knew she wanted some, but figured I would wait for her to ask for it rather than offer it to her, given that she was reluctant to change the channel.

Finally she asked, “Can I have a piece?”

In a dramatic fashion, I looked up at the ceiling, then lowered my gaze to the floor, and finally pressed my lips together as if I was grappling with a tough issue. “Hmm, I seem to recall asking if you wanted to order pizza, and you said no. Therefore, I only ordered a small pizza rather than a large. You know what a big appetite I have.”

“But I got hungry.”

“I guess we find ourselves in an interesting situation.”

“How’s that?”

“Well, on the one hand, I have the pizza, which you want—”

“You’re so cruel!” she said, laughing.

“On the other hand, you have control of the TV, which I would like to change the channel on. It’s quite an interesting situation.” I took a generous bite of pizza and then closed my eyes as if the taste was heavenly. “My goodness, this pizza is good.”

“I thought it was just okay.”

“I wasn’t appreciating it fully before.”

Sara shook her head. “You’re ridiculous.”

“I’m just kidding. You know that. Have some.” I gestured to the pizza box and Sara extracted a slice.

“This is really an opportune moment for you to make a benevolent gesture,” I remarked, “by switching the channel.”

“Fine,” she responded with a sigh. “Switch the channel.”

I felt a little guilty that I’d be getting my own way, and asked her two more times if she was sure it was okay. Each time she insisted it was, so finally I put the movie on.

 

 

7

An
initial client meeting is not unlike a first date. You ask questions to learn about the person’s history. You try to get a sense of her character. You try to discern whether she is trustworthy or someone who could turn out to be trouble. You gather facts and make judgments in order to decide whether or not you want things to go forward between the two of you.

Even though I kept all of those lines of inquiry in my mind during initial client interviews, I nevertheless took most of the cases that came my way. The exceptions were drug eviction cases that lacked compelling evidence in support of the tenant, simply because they were so difficult to win and the housing authority usually settled for nothing less than an immediate move-out date. When Alec was in the housing unit, he was much more selective than I was. He joked that I was as choosy when it came to taking new cases as a drunken sailor in a bar at 2 a.m. trying to pick up women. Our different approaches resulted from our divergent philosophies about the role of legal services. He wanted our office to operate more like a boutique law firm, putting a lot of time and attention into a small, select stable of cases that addressed larger, systemic issues facing poor people, such as housing discrimination in large apartment complexes and predatory lending. In the end, he wanted to take on fewer of the small cases that I handled on a day-to-day basis at housing court, which had historically been the bread-and-butter of legal services work. I was interested in working on big cases, too. You could make a difference with them for many people, and they were also more intellectually challenging. At the same time, I wasn’t prepared to abandon eviction clients. The stakes for them were just too high. And besides, to my mind, representing them was what legal services was all about.

When I greeted Anna in the waiting room, I noticed that she was wearing the same black winter coat that she had on at court. Her demeanor seemed a little more pleasant and relaxed. We sat down together in the conference room and she placed a large envelope on the table.

“So your son isn’t here,” I said.

“No, I couldn’t get in touch with him. Anyway, I brought some papers.” She began extracting documents from the envelope in a very careful manner. “I got a notice to quit and my lease. I got the court complaint you saw yesterday.”

Before looking at the papers, I obtained some personal information from her. Her full name was Anna Rivera, she was thirty-eight years old, worked part-time as a clerk at Wal-Mart, and received monthly SSI benefits. SSI was an acronym for Supplemental Security Income, a governmental program that provided financial assistance to disabled persons with little or no income. She had been on assistance for some time because she suffered from anxiety and depression. She was now in a trial period that allowed her to continue receiving benefits, but at a lesser amount, while she tested whether or not she was able to return to the workforce.

I picked up the notice to quit from the table and began reading it. It was dated January 8, 2004 and alleged:

 

You, your household members, or guests engaged in illegal drug activity in violation of section 6(g) and 7(b) of your lease agreement when: your son, Miguel Rivera, engaged in the illegal sale and distribution of a Class A substance (heroin) on or about January 5, 2004. Mr. Rivera was a passenger in a vehicle when he was arrested by the Worcester Police Department for selling and/or distributing a Class
A
substance at or near the Rite-Mart convenience store on Worcester Center Boulevard.

 

Just as I had anticipated, the notice was signed by Kevin
Merola
. I had a vague sense that something wasn’t quite right about it, but I didn’t know exactly what. I read it again starting from the top where it stated, “Fourteen (14) Day Notice to Quit,” and then it hit me—
Merola
had used the wrong type of notice. That was an error that could warrant a dismissal of the case.

A fourteen-day notice to quit must be served on the tenant prior to the commencement of a non-payment of rent case, but a thirty-day notice must be served in eviction cases that allege tenant misconduct, including illegal drug
activity that occurred off the premises. It puzzled me that a smart, experienced lawyer like
Merola
would make such an obvious mistake.

I went to section 6(g) of the lease which stated:

 

Any criminal activity that threatens the health, safety, or right to peaceful enjoyment of the premises by other tenants or any drug-related criminal activity on or off such premises, engaged in by a public housing tenant, any member of the tenant’s household, or any guest or other person under the tenant’s control, shall be cause for termination of tenancy.

 

I moved on to the next lease clause implicated by the notice, section 7(b), which stated in relevant part:

 

… if a tenant, any member of the tenant’s household, or guest is alleged to have engaged in any drug-related criminal activity on or near the premises, the tenancy may be terminated by a fourteen (14) day notice to quit.

 

Never before had I seen this particular lease clause in any of my other drug eviction cases. I figured that it had recently been put into effect. By serving a fourteen-day notice,
Merola
was quite obviously operating under the theory that the Rite-Mart was located near the premises.

“You may have already told me this at court, but how old is your son, Miguel?” I asked Anna.

“He just turned nineteen.”

“I see he’s on your lease.”

Maria nodded.
“Yeah.”

“Has he been arrested before for drugs?”

“Like when?”

“Any time.”

“Once before.”

“For what?”

“Marijuana.”

“Dealing or possession?”

“Just possession.
I don’t think it was much.”

“Do you know how much?”

Anna pursed her lips together and looked off to the side, then slowly began to shake her head. “No. He was a kid back then. I don’t know.”

“Do you know how old he was?”

Anna rolled her eyes upward.
“Sixteen, maybe.”

“What happened in court? It went to court, right?”

“He didn’t go to jail or anything.”

“Do you know specifically what happened to him?”

“No, I’m sorry. I don’t.”

“Has Miguel been arrested for anything else?”

She paused for a moment.
“One other thing.
Him
and some friends took a bike, a moped I think it was, that belonged to someone else. It was around that same time as the marijuana. They took a joy ride, you know, and the police caught them. They said they planned on giving it back.”

BOOK: Eric Dinnocenzo - The Tenant Lawyer
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