From the Daily News today:
State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has launched a probe into the potentially illegal tactics used by landlord Steven Croman, 47, to force rent-stabilized tenants out of their valuable apartments, a source said.
The AG is investigating potential violations of city and state laws, including numerous infractions related to tenant harassment by Croman, the source said.
The article includes a story from Cordelia and Graham Winton, who live in a building on East Eighth Street that Croman/9300 Realty bought last year.
They declined Croman's buyout offer, and remain living in their $1,250 apartment while neighbors above and below them pay $6,000.
When they returned from a vacation last Saturday, they discovered that someone cranked up the steam heat in their building while they were away.
The heat was so extreme, wine bottles had uncorked, spewing their contents on the floor. A glass cabinet shattered, wood shelves warped and collapsed, the plastic spray arm in the sink melted, an outlet popped out of the wall and the ceiling and walls bubbled.
You can read the article here for the rest of this.
Yesterday, the Daily News reported that Schneiderman slapped a cease-and-desist order on one of Croman's employees, ex-cop Anthony Falconite, who "tenants say has engaged in a campaign of harassment and intimidation to force them out."
Previously on EV Grieve:
Watch a lot of people speak out against Steve Croman and 9300 Realty
Despite plea, landlord doubling rent on East Village family with cancer-stricken 2 year old
[Photo of Steve and Harriet Croman by Astrid Stawiarz/Getty Images for DuJour]
23 comments:
Lets be clear, this is just another form of theft and harassment which New York City landlords get away with every day. If your neighbor did this to you or your property they would be locked up, but if your landlord does it to you it's treated as if its perfectly legal, which it clearly is not.
None of these landlords would accept this if it happened to them, and neither should anyone else. Just because you happen to own a building does not men you can treat tenants like inmates on Rikers Island. But unless the media gets involved nothing usually happens.
Luckily karma is finally catching up to Steve Cro-Magnon, who was voted one of the city's Worst Landlords by the Village Voice back in 1998. One down and a few thousand more to go....
"The heat was so extreme, wine bottles had uncorked, spewing their contents on the floor. A glass cabinet shattered, wood shelves warped and collapsed, the plastic spray arm in the sink melted, an outlet popped out of the wall and the ceiling and walls bubbled"
While I would like to see what is described above, actually happen to this dbag, I hope the plaintiffs are not going with this story as described here, as it's really not physically possible.
GOOD. I am sick of pieces of shit like this being able to destroy lives and neighborhoods and only seeing buildings as a way to make money. People live here!
This guy is one of the worst.
I have an experience watching an operation like Crowman's get investigated by the AG. The dirt bag lost everything! Between lawyers, business operations suddenly having to become kosher (='s profit loss), fines, time lost, etc. The AG does not give you time to breathe. The AG only gets involved when they know they will win.
Hopefully this will be a turning point and a lesson to Steven Croman's peers.
Steve and Harriet Croman's modus operandi is to buy small tenement buildings strictly because they have so few tenants the complaints never seemed to reach official's ears. IF someone bought 100-unit buildings uptown and did what he's been doing across a 1,000 plus units spread all over the Lower East Side the past dozen years, they would have been shut down and locked up a long time ago.
Ghoul
I agree this is horrible. I myself benefit from a very good rent stabilized apartment. But I am curious? Where were the $6000 a month apartment people, and everyone else while this was happening? In every building I know in the hood, steam heat affects all apartments in the building. Just saying...
THE LOWEST BOWELS OF HELL ARE TOO GOOD FOR STEVE AND CROMAN
2014 -
THE FALL OF THE CROMAN EMPIRE !
I live in a Croman building and I can attest that there is no heat and hot water all winter. Then in the sweltering heat of summer there is no hot water to take a shower and you have only ice cold water to shower. Then comes the intense heat coming out of the radiators that HPD defines as "summer heat, " that once when I came home I discovered that eventhough the windows were open, this heat dried up all my plants and burned the leaves and the paint actually blistered on the walls from the intense heat. Then there are many days of no water at all because they are renovating apartments. These are a few tactics from their arsonal of tricks to harass their tenants. The supers are sickos and the property managers are psychopaths who treat the tenants like trash. Then there is trash pile-ups because there is no maintence, and the vermin, rats and insects that feast upon this rot. How many of Croman buildings are plagued with bedbugs and he doesn't exterminate all the adjoining apartments as required by law. Steve and Harriet Croman are sociopaths. Their greed knows no bounds. Let them stay locked up in one of their own apartments to freeze their butts off or to toast in their own summer heat.
The pot's getting hot Mr & Mrs. Croman. May all the misery you have inflicted on your tenants
fall back on you a hundred fold.
Your tenants will celebrate the day that justice is rendered and you are both in jail where you belong.
It certainly causes one to wonder what kind of a cop this Cronan flunky might have been. I bet a review of his arrests would open a real can of worms. In all my life, I only met one cop I didn't hate but even he let me down. Sad.
Scum. My building is up for sale (although tenants are in court fighting it; long story) and I'm horrified this is the fate that awaits us.
The censorship in the comments in this blog is worse than the one in China. You can't comment satirically or in negative fashion to what the blogger likes. Delusional.
I see this landlord's Croman Real Estate and ugly 9300Realty Apartments for Rent Signs plastered on his buildings all over the lower east side. They are eyesores and I question is there some sort of visual pollution violation he can get? He's known to be a real prick of a landlord who gets most of his tenants out by harassing them, or using the landlord's lightning as was done at his building at 127 East 7th St., deemed arson. Let's hope he gets indicted. My sympathy to his tenants.
AnonymASS 12:39: If you don't like it, start your OWN damned blog (not that you'll have many readers, which is why you come here, eh?)
Is the Daily Ooze sure that Croman is 47? If so, he looks at least 10-15 years older. May his next few years find him rotting in jail, where he belongs....
I'm glad they're investigating. And a cease and desist is reassuring.
So did these people just leave their radiator wide open when they left town? Maybe that is why the other apartments were not effected. Ours is always off tight in the winter. It just gets too damn hot. If you leave town, you need to shut off your radiator, except who would check twice in July? Wondering if the super had keys and had come in to be sure it was on, and how deep the investigation went.
The awful story about Croman's arson and the poor puppy, on the other hand, is pretty clear cut: http://bit.ly/1kiPilD
Thank you Eric Schneiderman for preventing this pilfering lunatic from further destruction of tenants' homes. It's been a long time in coming and I commend you for taking the Croman issue seriously. You have my vote!
Croman-you're going down the plughole!!
Chris Flash 6:10 pm - Eh - Why do you come here??? I read EV Grieve because it is excellent.
Put your glasses on and you'll see
Stevie & Harriet Croman's buildings all have their "Signature look." (Home Depot Decor) They all have the same flower boxes on the ground floor windows, the same fake wainscoting walls that are actually cheap sheetrock with cheap molding made to look like
wood, and the same exposed brick walls, the same public lobbies and same wooden doors, hallways made of cheap plywood with the old mailboxes still in place because the Cromans are too cheap to buy nice secure ones, the same public hallways with mismatched apt. steps, uneven apartment numbers on the apartment doors, and those dreadful apartment for rent signs Croman plasters all over his buildings, visually polluting the neighborhood. Tacky, tacky, tacky.
Dear Eric Schneiderman....The Croman's, both Steve and Harriet Croman should be put on trial for ' Crimes Against Humanity.'
May they spend the rest of their lives in jail because of the torture and depraved indifference they have inflicted upon their tenants.
Croman needs hard time. We in society need to reject these Cromans completely. New money at its most embarrassing.
I am pinching myself that justice apparently has come around for Croman. I live in one of his buildings and have dealt with the goombah-style threatening tactics of Falconite. These guys were serious sleazebags that were operating without fear of repercussion...one can only assume because they had all the right political connections. I'm amazed that the tide's turned...I'll certainly be raising a toast to the AG if Croman gets what's coming to him.
Post a Comment