In February 2009, a man who said that he lived and worked nearby for years told Jill the following about the building:
It used to be a place that sold tuxedos and formal wear. The family had several children, but one of them, a daughter, was raped and murdered in the top floor, possibly in the 1940's [note: it was actually 1974].
The killer was never found. The children (or one of them and a spouse?) still live there and refuse to renovate or change anything. The top floor is exactly the way it was when the daughter was murdered and you can still see the powder where the cops dusted for fingerprints. This man had been inside once and was witness to its originality. He said they have no intention of selling or changing or even of renting out the storefront.
The name of the family is Sopolsky.
This is from The New York Times, dated Jan. 18, 1974:
The nude body of a 40-year-old woman propietor of a tailor shop that rents tuxedos on the Lower East Side was found bludgeoned to death. The victim was Helen Sopolsky of 84 Second Avenue, near fifth Street, whose shop is one flight up at that address. The motive of the attack was not determined immediately...."
Here's more history of 84 via Lost City from February 2012:
It was a temporary home for women in 1884, open to "self-supporting homeless young women, with or without a child." Morris Kosturk, 40, was found dead there in 1921. And Aaron Schneider, who lived here in 1964, was the victim of a hit and run driver.
For years (decades?), you could see a plastic-covered dinner jacket in the second-story window with the neon sign that reads "DRESS SUITS TO HIRE."
"Joey Ramone Place" is perhaps the most stolen of the 250,900 street signs in New York, according to the Department of Transportation, which recently asked contractors to install the sign for the fourth time since 2003.
He would have appreciated the distinction, said the group's longtime drummer, Marky Ramone, sole survivor of the Ramones' longest-running lineup.
"But maybe they should find a better way to attach it," he said. "Now you have to be an NBA player to see it."
Although most street signs are about 12 to 14 feet off the ground, Joey Ramone Place was raised to 20 feet, an oddity first noted on the blog EV Grieve.
