American Justice: Smokers, the con man and the quality of our lives
Once again Wednesday, I found myself sitting in Department 101 of the Van Nuys Municipal Court to observe the case of the People of Los Angeles vs. Nadya Mahdavi and Fidelity Investments LLC who are accused in a criminal complaint of illegally converting a single-family house in my tract into a three-apartment tenement.
She was standing in the hallway chatting on her cell phone and smiled sweetly at me as I headed into the courtroom. She was there to finally enter a plea to the four misdemeanor charges dating back nine months to when the Building and Safety Department first cited her for construction without a permit.
As the citations grew in number and finally turned into criminal charges, Mahdavi had managed to avoid even getting to the point of entering a plea, first by failing to appear, then appearing without a lawyer and then getting a continuance.
Assistant City Attorney Don Cocek assured me she wouldn’t get another delay.
So I sat in court and listened to case after case of people facing everything from petty theft to drug charges to building code violations to spousal abuse.
Muncipal courts are fascinating, the place where ordinary people come against the law with little chance of escaping the consequences.
Nancy Johnson and Nzinga Owolo, like most of the defendants, found there was no alternative to pleading guilty to the crime they were accused of: Smoking in the park.
“Cigarettes?” I asked Johnson.
“Yes,” she said, “my cousin and I went to Balboa Park to fish, for tilapia mostly, and we lit up cigarettes and we’re just talking when the ranger came up and wrote us up.”
Johnson and Owolo pleaded guilty and were fined $30 each. But the court costs raised their penalty to $250 each because smoking in the park is a misdemeanor crime, not just an infraction, so the fees are high and they now have criminal records which makes those fish they were catching pretty expensive.
“It’s crap” Johnson said. “Ridiculous There’s no signs posted. We went around the park and took pictures but nobody cares. They just want your money.”
Cocek didn’t really disagree and added it isn’t just the city, it’s
people like 82-year-old Albert Prizant who has a habit of posing as a
contractor, running ads in the newspaper and going out to people’s
houses and getting their deposit for work he never does.
I
followed Cocek up to Department 105 where Prizant was brought in
handcuffed in a blue jail jumpsuit. He had been arrested on warrants
for failing to pay $15,000 in fines and failing to pay $4,500 in
restitution to his victims.
Cocek was determined to put an end
to Prizant’s career as a con man and offered to clear up the old cases
if he agreed to serve 95 more day in jail on top of the 270 he already
was credited with.
“This guy needs to be locked up,” the prosecutor said. “He needs to spend life in prison on the installment plan.”
Cocek
wasn’t kidding. On Tuesday, Prizant was charged with a felony after
state Contracting Licensing Board investigators set up a sting
operation and caught him preying on victims of the recent Sylmar brush
fire. The investigation turned up seven more victims that Cocek can
file misdemeanor charges over as well.
By the time we got back
to Department 101, Mahdavi was talking intensely with her Encino
attorney Gerald Cobb. An hour later Cobb came into the courtroom and
spent 30 minutes talking privately with the prosecutor and Building and
Safety officials.
Finally, just after noon, the case was called.
Cobb entered a not guilty plea and it was over. Mahdavi never even came
into the courtroom.
Her trial was set for Jan. 22, a year
after she bought the house in my tract out of foreclosure and began
converting it into apartments and flipping its ownership to an employee
of her real estate company and to Fidelity Investments that lists her
as an officer.
The latter point was disputed by Cobb in his talk
with Cocek. Cobb said the president of the company is her husband,
Nasir Shaikh, and he was nowhere to be seen.
Something about it all came into focus for me.
Justice
was swift and costly for the two women who went fishing for their
dinner and violated a law supposedly intended to protect the quality of
life in the community by stopping people from smoking in a public park.
But the quality of life of my neighborhood is still in jeopardy after all these months.
Tenants
still occupy the three apartments, the neighbors are still upset and
worried that if Mahdavi and company can get away with this, it will
happen again and again until the quiet little tract where they have
lived in peace for 50 years becomes a slum like so much of the city has
become.
It’s not news that people with money, with lawyers, get treated differently than people who can’t afford lawyers.
But it seems to me something bigger is at stake here.
We
have invented new categories of crimes that are at worst petty offenses
that could be solved by telling people like Johnson and Owolo to put
out their cigarettes but we are helpless to stop guys like Prizant
until they have made fools of dozens of people or people like Mahdavi
who play the system itself for a fool.
Ron, as is typical of Los Angeles Liberals, you consistently see the problem but you completely miss the obvious solution.
You say, “But it seems to me something bigger is at stake here.
We have invented new categories of crimes that are at worst petty offenses that could be solved by telling people like Johnson and Owolo to put out their cigarettes but we are helpless to stop guys like Prizant until they have made fools of dozens of people or people like Mahdavi who play the system itself for a fool.”
I must enlighten you. This emphasis on enforcing obscure and ridiculous laws, like this anti-smoking in the park law, is the fault of extremist Liberal politics and policies. These policies don’t appear out of thin air!!! WE DIDN’T INVENT THIS PROBLEM. YOU GUYS DID.
The reason Park Rangers don’t simply warn smokers in the park, instead of citing them, is because of policies by union protected management who will do anything to please their extremist Liberal benefactors. That’s the sad fact about living in Los Angeles. Instead of creating common sense policies that most Los Angeles residents believe are most important to them, the Los Angeles City Management creates policies that are most important to wacko Liberal, political contributors.
Simply put, get rid of the union protected, politically correct city management and then you lose the absurd “green”, non issues that are pushed onto us as city policy. What is left are issues, such as safety, that should be in the forefront as problems to solve.
HELLO???? HELLO???? Case for the above. The misguided GUN CONTROL LAWS recently passed by Villaraigosa and his cronies at the City Council and misleadingly reported as GANG CONTROL MEASURES.
March 3, 2009 is Election Day – Vote, remind your friends and neighbors to vote. We need a large count to make a difference in City Hall.
At stake: Mayor, comptroller, coucil seats, propositions. Forget the Unions and what they want you to do. You have your own private vote and noone, repeat, noone can know how you vote in case you are intimidated by anyone. On January 1, we all in LA will be paying a 9 percent sales tax! That means all taxable items will be costing you more (and among the highest taxesin the nation) and that was because so many stayed home and the rest voted yes. Don’t you care what happens to you and your family? Of course you do. All we have in the way of power over our own lives is our vote. So it is very important for you to vote in this upcoming election.
Ron, I’m sorry your neighborhood is being destroyed – MINE TOO. And I’m pissed.
But people like Mr. Paranoid Scofflaw, aka Anon 8:43 pm cannot complain that there is some sort of injustice about actually enforcing the law. It simply sounds to me like the LA City Park Rangers do their job effectively, while Building and Safety doesn’t.
I know you’re a smoker, Ron, so you are probably not happy with seeing fellow smokers being fined. That said, here are a few facts and figures on smoking in LA City parks:
1. Cigarettes cause the vast majority of brush fires in City parks. These fires endanger people’s lives, destroy City resources/wildlife/habitat, and cost taxpayers tons and tons of money.
2. There is a curb to curb smoking ban in ALL Los Angeles parks. A-L-L.
3. No one has the constitutional right to endanger others.
4. Second-hand smoke is extremely dangerous. Even more so for children whose lungs are still developing.
5. As for the claims of ‘no signs’, there are plenty of signs stating No Open Flames. There are also a comprehansive list of park rules at all main entrances to Sepulveda and its associated facilities (Lake Balboa is one of them.)
As someone who volunteers 800 hours a year in City parks, quite honestly there isn’t enough enforcement of the no smoking ordinance. I cannot say how many times I see illegal smokers throwing their butts down in or near dry brush, or how many of these butts I pick up or rake up myself in and around brush. If you’ve been in S CA for any time at all and have any cognitive ability at all, you know about wildfires. Lighting any flame in and around brush in S CA endangers lives. It is tantamount to attempted murder and should be treated accordingly.
As for your neighborhood problem, I’m definitely looking forward to the day Don Cocek finally puts the nail in the coffin of little Miss Slumlord Princess and her Mafia-wannabe husband!
Based on public perception what grade (A-D) do you give these eighteen, highly paid, elected officials based on overall impression in 2008?
Mayor Villaraigosa (D)
City Attorney Delgadillo (D)
City Controller Chick (A)
1. Reyes (D)
2. Greuel (C)
3. Zine (C)
4. LaBonge (C)
5. Weiss (D)
6. Cardenas (D)
7. Alarcon (D)
8. Parks (C)
9. Perry (D)
10. Wesson (B)
11. Rosendahl (C)
12. Smith (D)
13. Garcetti (C)
14. Huizar (C)
15. Hahn (C)
LaBonge = F
I live in a hillside ordinance area which means the street is less than 30 ft. I have a house across from me that the homeowner has chopped into 3 or 4 separate “apartments” that he has rented out. With today’s economy you can understand why this might happen, however there are other repercussions.
The street has only about 8 homes and is very narrow with parking only allowed on one side for firetruck access. The other side is restricted and towaway zone. Since this is no longer a single-family dwelling, this one has 12 vehicles that monopolize the whole street. If you want to put out your trash or have visitors, just forget it. Also, the homeowner is not subject to the inspections or requirements that apartment owners are subject to. When I called code-enforcement a couple of years ago when all this started I inquired how many un-related people could be living in one house. I was told no more than 4, but that they were not allowed to enforce it, due to a court case. So, it appears that most of our code enforcement regulations are toothless and those of us that must live adjacent to these scofflaws must put up with their transgressions (such as stuffing their trash in your trash cans, etc; unpermitted construction that went on at night and on weekends,etc, etc) Believe me all these things were reported to Buildng & Safety code enforcement and what was the result:: NO VIOLATION!!! For any of the complaints, even thoough I myself and other neighbors needed permits for more minor activities. It’s a joke and this is the “world-class” city our Mayor is encouraging.
All your problems are slight. The overcrowding the parking on the street the sidewalk and the grass. Kids playing in your yard and theirs. clothes hanging on the front porch and the fence. Boy Villar won’t stop until it looks like TJ
“..it will happen again and again until the quiet little tract where they have lived in peace for 50 years becomes a slum like so much of the city has become.”
I believe that what Ron is talking about is in large part due to the massive level of immigration into the city over the past 20-30 years. As of 2005, more than a third(!) of the population here was born not only outside of the city and outside of the state, but outside of the country (http://www.migrationinformation.org/datahub/gcmm/LosAngeles2005DataSheet.pdf). With such influxes, it is easy to imagine how the connectedness of the population to the city and its culture, institutions and history would decay. With often only superficial ties to the culture and the people here, newcomers frequently don’t feel much obligation to protect and preserve the city, or neighborhoods like Ron’s, which have been built and nurtured over generations. As long as this level of population change continues, it’ll be hard to maintain what we’ve got.
I’d have asked the smoker why she and her friend didn’t just pay the fine right away? Why delay paying?
As for the builders without a permit, let’s see if they put the home up for sale. Let’s also see if they get cited after the trial. I just don’t understand people. If she wanted to buy a tri-plex why didn’t she just buy a triplex? If she had bought a decent triplex at market rates she could charge higher rents for a decent building in a good location and she’d be making more money doing it the legal way than what she has made on rents for her mickey-mouse remodel.
What both of these cases have in common is that both of them could have made their lives easier, happier and avoided being in the courtroom altogether if they had just followed the rule of law and paid their simple fines, or paid a fair price for a triplex.
There is something in our society that has infected the masses. Somehow massive numbers of people are walking through life believing that they never do anything wrong. That’s how both of these women wound up in court.
Let’s face it—we all do wrong sometimes. We all need to be grown-up enough to face up to that reality, pay our fines or pay our dues or rectify what we have done wrong, and then move on with our lives.
But what you saw that day was two women who do not adhere to the life philosphy I have just described. Lord knows they are not alone. Weaseling out of personal responsibility is a second job for some.
I know this Mahdavi girl and her husband very well. I am a victim of their scams and have suffered tremendously because of them. They always get away with murder because of their money. I pray to God that her and her husband finally get what they deserve!
And for the record Ms.Mahdavi only has 2 kids not four!
I know this Mahdavi girl and her husband very well. I am a victim of their scams and have suffered tremendously because of them. They always get away with murder because of their money. I pray to God that her and her husband finally get what they deserve!
And for the record Ms.Mahdavi only has 2 kids not four!