The mother, Felita Smith, had a son who pled guilty to dealing drugs near their subsidized housing unit. The dealing wasn’t out of her home. It wasn’t even on the premises. But it was close enough. And Smith’s son technically lived under her roof—therefore, the crime was cause for eviction.

“If I could do it any other way, I would,” said Smith, “But my lease says I have to move, so I have to move.”

“This is very tough,” said Zeldon, after hearing Smith’s resigned tone. She ultimately held her line though: “This is part of D.C.’s effort to keep public housing drug-free.”

Early in the afternoon’s proceedings, Lisa Dessel stepped up toward the bench. She represented claims by the DC Housing Authority.

Many of Dessel’s defendants were no-shows. But two particularly memorable people came up. One was Shakesha Belt, who was being forced to leave her subsidized unit because she’d been caught with drugs in somebody else’s drug-filled home.

“I was there to do the person’s hair. I had just arrived at the lady’s house, I didn’t even have a chance to sit down before the police came in, ” she stated.

But this wasn’t a simple wrong place/wrong time case. Belt also had some weed on her person when the cops raided the unit.

“So you weren’t exactly an innocent hair dresser,” said Judge Zeldon.

Alas, the court’s lunch break was drawing to a close. It was time to put the robes back on.

]]> http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/housingcomplex/2009/06/25/landlord-tenant-court-you-werent-exactly-an-innocent-hair-dresser/feed/ 1 http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/housingcomplex/2009/06/25/landlord-tenant-court-even-the-urdu-interpreter-cant-break-the-deadlock/ http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/housingcomplex/2009/06/25/landlord-tenant-court-even-the-urdu-interpreter-cant-break-the-deadlock/#comments Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:56:18 +0000 Ruth Samuelson http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/housingcomplex/?p=7146 Earlier in the day, Judge Joan Zeldon made one thing perrrrrrfectly clear to her courtroom: You need an interpreter, you’ll get an interpreter.

But just because said interpreter arrives, doesn’t mean he or she will be able to make sense of things.

Case in point: Gulzar Hussain and his son Anwaar Hussain, both Pakistani-born, arrived at the courthouse bright and early to deal with a claim for nearly $40,000 in unpaid back rent to a Georgia Avenue property.

Now, at least five hours later, they’re at a deadlock with Hussain’s tenant.

The tenant—a Ghanian woman, who didn’t want her name revealed—says Hussain’s lying about the amount of back rent. She’s missed three and a half months of rent, roughly $10,000. A month and a half ago, she was hit by car, and was forced to close her restaurant, which operates on the ground-floor of Hussain’s property.

The woman, who walks with crutches and pulled up her pant-leg to reveal a bandaged knee, says (through the help of a friend) that her lawyers told her to close her restaurant so she won’t further injure herself. She’s suing the driver that struck her, and expects a settlement soon. Then, she’ll pay Hussain.

She has no idea where the $40,000 claim comes from. But Hussain’s tricky with money, she says. In the past, he’s refused to give her receipts, her friend says.

The entire story’s baloney, according to Hussain (speaking through his interpreter Faisal Khan, who drove in from Urbana Maryland this morning). For their entire landlord/tenant relationship, the tenant has constantly cried and made excuses, and only paid part of the rent. In the past, according to Hussain, she’s stated that she had a house in D.C. for sale. She’d paid him when the home sold. And now, she keeps talking about how she’ll be flush with cash when her car accident court case concludes and she gets a settlement.

Everything’s on hold for now though. Hussain didn’t fill out his paperwork properly. So he’s dropping his case and filing a new one—this time, with a lawyer, most likely.

The tenant landed in court back in March for failing to pay $7,000 in back rent to her landlord. When she finally forked over the payment, she also signed a new agreement stating that she wouldn’t be late on rent again.

She was late in June, landlord Barrington Bowen claims—and now she owes him an additional $1,150 in rent, plus fees. The landlord wasn’t happy to be involved in a second run-around. “I’m tired of chasing after this woman,” he told the court. “I’ve had it, and I want my property back.”

The tenant’s lawyer, who was communicating with the tenant in Spanish, protested that the woman didn’t understand what she was agreeing to, since the court failed to supply an interpreter during the proceedings.

Judge Joan Zeldon—she of cell-phone borrowing fame—wasn’t buying the language barrier excuse.

“I simply don’t believe that,” Zeldon said, adding that the court “bends over backward” to provide interpreters during hearings. A Spanish interpreter is on-hand at the court each morning, and other language-speakers are summoned on request—an Urdu interpreter, in fact, was on the way.

Zeldon went back to the record to settle the bilingual dispute. According to court documents, Zeldon pointed out, the March agreement had been “read by an interpreter in open court.” Zeldon pointed to the line in the document and shook her head. The tenant, at least, understood the body language.

Reporting by Ruth Samuelson

Joseph has been trying to secure the rent from Karina Okoro, who occupies a one-bedroom unit in Joseph’s 23-unit Petworth apartment building, since November of last year. At one point, marshals arrived at the complex ready to evict Okoro, who asked for an hour to get Joseph his money. When he came to collect, she was gone.

At her court date in front of Judge Joan Zeldon this morning, Okoro again proved a no-show. During the course of the proceedings, it was suggested that Okoro may be in a more relaxed state than her anxious landlord—she was spending some time in Florida.

Zeldon, unable to make long-distance phone calls from the court’s land line, asked to borrow Joseph’s cell phone in order to give Okoro a little tinkle. Later, Zeldon realized that despite Okoro’s exotic locale, the number was kosher to call from court.

But Okoro failed to make a long-distance appearance as well. “Tell her this is Judge Zeldon calling from the bench,” Zeldon said to whoever was screening Okoro’s calls. She had a message regarding the landlord. “It looks like she’s just stonewalling him, and I just really can’t permit that to happen.”

Reporting by Ruth Samuelson