First of all, one must know the definition of a slumlord. A slumlord is an unscrupulous landlord who milks a property without concern for tenants. Slumlords overcharge for property that is kept in poor repair and allowed to deteriorate.

Secondly, a slumlord is easy to get along with, until you complain about a condition which needs repair.

Thirdly, a slumlord is usually represented by an attorney who allows and encourages their client to lie under oath and does not advise their client to do the right thing.

Lastly, a slumlord court is one in which a judge refuses to protect the tenant in favor of that landlord, despite proof that the landlord has violated the statutes. With his or her loyalty being towards the attorney who is representing them.

I have just had to deal with this in Pima County Consolidated Justice Court … for the third time. And if you are a person of color, you can forget all about justice. But on this, the third time, I have decided to speak out, and name names.

I have moved away, but I continuing to fight the bogus judgment and attorney’s fees for the sake of my rental credit history and my credit history. I filed an appeal, and unlike before, this time the judge refused to allow oral arguments, and made a rapid ruling, affirming the actions of the slumlord, the attorney, and Pima County Consolidated Justice Court.

I lived at 2018 North Tucker Drive. How did I come to live there? Ten years ago, I got evicted, even though my rent was paid to the court. The Constable at the time, Archibald Cox, called me on the telephone and told me that I had to get out or he would physically remove me. I went to the courthouse, and appeared before Judge Peyton. However, he did not believe me, and the last words he ever said to me were: “The constable wouldn’t do that.” And why not? Because my rent was paid and there was no order signed for him to do so.  And yet, on that Monday January 28, 2008 morning, Cox appeared with the property manager, and their attorney and did just that. I was in shock, and my son who had just moved in with me, was also shocked, but he, much less than myself. We had nowhere to go and no money, because my rent for the month had already been spent…on rent! My son was working, and he paid for movers and everything, so we were practically moved out by the time he arrived, but I still had items in there. I sat in front of the bus stop with some belongings, waiting for a taxi to take some items to my mother’s house, and I cried. All of the neighbors, (the drug addicts and prostitutes, were laughing at me. But my son using a taxi, rode around a found the place on Tucker, the same day. The company name is RC&C Limited Partnership. The owners are : Rose Collins, Marianne Powell, and Andrea (Andy) Collins, (a male).

We signed a lease, and because we were desperate, agreed to take care of the weeds, etc. I still had not seen the place. The Collins family saw us coming, and had addendum after addendum, and we agreed to it. We even agreed to pay the water, and I personally changed the name from Rose Collins, the matriarch, to our name.  (But, Andrea Collins later lied under oath, to the Arizona Attorney General and said that they never required us to do either thing. But The AZ attorney general didn’t care that he lied to them.)

When I finally saw the place, my heart sank. And I spent the majority of the first night running from sewer roaches. The Collins family NEVER did anything about the cockroaches … EVER. The carpet had been in there for at least forty years, and they did not paint or clean it at all. So, in the ensuing years, I spent a small fortune on bug spray and painted every room every two years. They NEVER painted. They NEVER did anything. i had carpet professionally installed in my son’s bedroom, and purchased carpet for the rest of the house in order to cove the old stained carpet that was there when we arrived. I remember when the lock broke due to age, and Andrea (Andy) said that they were not going to replace it! I told him that there would just be a hole then, because I wasn’t going to replace it. He ultimately was told by his mother to purchase it, and I told them that I would install it. Which I did. Then there was the time when the old toilet seat broke, and I purchased one. But the daughter, Marianne Powell, said that they did not reimburse for toilet seats, and that it was my responsibility. I even painted the front porch. There was never central air conditioning, just a window unit in each room. So I learned to use fans to relay the air from each of the bedrooms to the rest of the house.

The bathtub faucet did not work, and I told them about it several times, and even put it in an answer to their lawsuit, (which I won), but they never fixed it. I wrapped it in duck tape to stabilize it. But Andy told the Arizona Attorney General that I was making it up. I even installed the shower head. And when they decided to paint the facial over the porch, I was able to see the rotting wood, which explained the condensation coming through the ceiling.

The refrigerator which was in the house when we arrived was a piece of junk that stopped working about two months after we moved in. So, we would buy other used ones, and Marianne told me to put the outer one out to the curb. They had promised us a washing machine that was already there, but two days after we moved in, Andy came and got it.  Ultimately, a neighbor gave us one, which we used until we moved.

My son had been my mother’s caregiver for five years, and after she passed away, he was trying to make his room more livable. There was an electric heater in the wood ceiling. My son paid an electrician to come and fix it, but the electrician said that it was not up to code and he could not repair it as it was a fire hazard. See Photo. You can see where it was in the photo. So he changed so that it would be a light fixture, and he also fixed the other three outlets in the room that did not work.

We would use one of the long orange extension cords from the kitchen to his room. He also paid to have a professional carpenter to fix the lock on the side gate, and a neighbor who is a professional contractor, fixed the door on the shed for us so that we could lock it, as it had all of my mother’s belongings in there and other valuables as well as heirlooms.

Then, after my mother passed away, an agency agreed to help us pay a very large portion of the rent. But first, there had to be an inspection. Marrianne agreed to have all of the repairs done. Including moving the window unit out of the window, since that too was a fire hazard. But after moving it, the old one, (which was about five years old), just stopped working. (Prior to my son complaining about the air conditioner, their maintenance man did a great job on replacing the air conditioner for my room. see photo. But he did a deliberately awful job on the one for my son’s room after he complained about no air conditioning. See photo)

Now, mind you, this was September, 2017, still very hot in Tucson, so, for the first time ever, my son complained, and I agreed he should. Andy didn’t like that, and he admitted to the AZ attorney general that this was the reason they wanted us to move! And Rose Collins refused to put a screen on the window! (See photo)

And he admitted it in writing! Judge Pro Tem (not a real elected judge), Benzvidez refused to admit it into court, then it mysteriously disappeared and was not with the other exhibits. Hmmmm. But I have copies.

So, in June 2018, Andy changed the account so we could not pay our rent. I had it taken via courier. He held onto it for most of the month, then returned it. I suppose that was after he met with the attorney, Blythe Edmondson.  So for ten years, this was my life. Clearly, they meet the definition of slum lords, and this is not even all of it. There is so much more. Yet the properties for their White students are in great shape, and they even pull the weeds and pay water for all of their other properties. They got away with it for ten years! Then one complaint and they turned on us. smh

(Next blog: Pima County Consolidated Justice Court proceedings.)