Slumlord and the Law

It is not against the law for slumlord Nathaniel Wells to continue to run his substandard empire while serving a four-year prison term for a mountain of health- and safety-code violations. But there is something very wrong when he is let off the hook for seizing the property of a tenant whom he evicted, keeping it for four months and not returning all of it when finally ordered by a court to do so.

Wells went to jail after lesser punishments failed to win much relief for his tenants in South-Central Los Angeles. Between 1967 and 1982 Wells’ tenants won at least 40 court judgments for harassment, theft of property and renting property unfit for human beings. But Wells evaded process servers and ignored court orders until prosecutors nailed him in 1982 and won the stiffest sentence ever imposed on a slumlord.

Wells still controls many rental properties. Four months ago he had Agnes Fowler and her seven children evicted. His lawyer says that she wasn’t paying her rent. She says that she was trying to get needed repairs made. Wells’ agents took Fowler’s furniture and clothing. Some of that was returned earlier this month under court order. Still missing, Fowler says, are $150 in cash, a bicycle, bunk beds, a refrigerator and other items worth about $2,500.

But Municipal Judge Lorna Parnell held that Wells had substantially complied with the order to return the property. Wells demands full compliance from tenants in the form of regular rent payments; the same should have been expected of him. He should have been made to restore all the missing property or pay for it in full. Adding to his prison sentence wouldn’t have been a bad idea, either. No wonder that he thinks he can get away with flouting the law; he just did.