Injunction Cleans Up Sunland Houses

A Tujunga woman has largely complied with a court order to remove mounds of garbage from property she owns in Sunland, but she still faces court-ordered restrictions aimed at countering alleged drug use and sales on the property, authorities said Friday.

The owner and tenants have hauled away most of the garbage and have planted flowers and shrubs but must still remove or store auto parts, tires and wood heaped in the backyard, said Reid Davidson, an environmental health officer with the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services.

“It’s about 90%” cleared of the garbage, Davidson said after inspecting the property Friday afternoon.

But Mike Qualls, a spokesman for City Atty. James K. Hahn, said cleaning up the garbage would comply with only one of several provisions of a temporary restraining order issued on Wednesday by Superior Court Judge Jerry K. Fields.

The order was aimed at stopping what Hahn described as drug use and sales on the property in the 10500 block of Jardine Avenue. Qualls said the city attorney’s office would seek a permanent injunction at an Oct. 6 hearing.

The judge, in the temporary order, instructed the owner of the property, Virginia J. Stevens, and her son, Robert Stevens, 41, to clean up the garbage. The judge also told police to post signs stating that the property is under court-ordered restrictions and police surveillance.

Two homes rest on one lot owned by Virginia Stevens, who lives in Tujunga. Her son lives in the house at the rear of the property. The front house is rented to another tenant.

The court order was sparked by a lawsuit maintaining that state and city nuisance-abatement laws were being violated on the property.

The suit was prompted by a petition signed by 32 neighbors who said they had complained about the garbage and about late-night noise for about three years.

Qualls said Los Angeles is the first city in the state to use nuisance-abatement laws to combat drug-related crime. The city filed a similar lawsuit on Sept. 5, 1986, against a home in the 2100 block of Cyril Avenue in East Los Angeles and another on Oct. 31, 1986, against a home in the 1500 block of East O Street in Wilmington, he said.

Virginia Stevens blamed the problems associated with her property on unreasonable neighbors bent on harassing her son because he is unconventional. She said that, if there has been any drug use on the property, it has been by people who do not live there.

Robert Stevens could not be reached for comment, but one of his two roommates, Gary Burrows, said those living on the property collected cardboard, cans and other refuse for recycling.

Neighbors were generally pleased by the court order, but one, Maureen Stead, said the garbage had been cleaned up before. Her husband, Douglas, started a petition drive that led to a meeting with the city attorney’s office.