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203 Bellefontaine Property
The Corrales family
As Caltrans tenants and readers of the LA Times are aware, Caltrans has sent an eviction notice to the Corrales family, who moved from a Caltrans house that had major safety and health violations, to another Caltrans home on Bellefontaine. The Corrales family has and is in compliance with the Caltrans rental procedures. The eviction notice for Christmas Eve, was followed by an illegal "5-Day Notice To Pay Or Quit" served on them at 11 PM. The following letter, written by David Corrales, is in response to some of these events and subsequent occurrences. David has given us permission to copy his letter to you with the intention of letting people know how bad Caltrans conducts their business with the tenants and the seriousness of the charges. Our hope is that this letter will empower tenants who have had or may have similar Caltrans problems happen to them. Every tenant has rights!
January 22, 2003
Linda Wilford
Regional Property Services Manager
DOT, District 7
801 South Grand Avenue, 17th Floor
Los Angeles, CA 90017
Dear Ms. Wilford:
This letter is to formally notify you that we, the Corrales family value our privacy highly and insist that our legal rights to that privacy as guaranteed to us under section 1954 of the Civil Code be respected; specifically, where you have made false remarks including rumors and false accusations about our family to other tenants and strangers. These false accusations include; releasing our financial information and earnings, stating false qualification information, questioning neighbors and the Mail carrier about our whereabouts. We know about the Mail carrier because he was so concerned, that he came to tell us about your inquisition. You also have told other tenants and strangers that we do not qualify to live in the 203 Bellefontaine property and that we have had conversations with you that we know nothing about. Including, stating that we agreed to things that we never agreed to.
You sent a Process Server to post a “5-Day Notice To Pay Rent Or Quit” on our door at 11 p.m. at night, which was an illegal notice, unsigned with no payment information. You have also told my wife, Gloria Corrales, a mother of three young children, that she should get a job so that we can qualify for the 203 Bellefontaine property. You continue to spread false rumors and accusations that we may have bribed a State employee regarding renting the Bellefontaine property.
A Caltrans tenant has told us that he witnessed an incident at our previous property, 925 Jane Place. He related to us that you and Mr. Jimmy S. Li, your Senior Right of Way Agent, came to the Jane Place property on Wednesday, January 15, 2003 and rummaged through our garbage and trash cans. We can only assume that you and your assistant were looking for evidence to support your claim and your rumor that somehow we were involved in a criminal act, including bribing a State employee.
This is outrageous behavior from a State employee whose salary is paid by our hard earned taxpayer money. This is a violation of our civil rights. You have impugned my family’s reputation and integrity in our own neighborhood, which is grounds for a slander and defamation of character lawsuit. Our rights to privacy and peaceful occupancy have now been disturbed and severely damaged. This is not acceptable behavior from a government agency that should be held to a higher standard then the private sector. There is no legitimate purpose to these actions which are just plain malicious. Your actions are causing my family emotional and physical distress. We feel emotional suffering as we visit in our neighborhood. Your behavior is flagrant and opening Caltrans to a major lawsuit. This sort of gossip is a violation of our privacy. In no situation, has there been any emergency involved to warrant these actions. This has caused us considerable anxiety and stress, to the point that our attempt to have peaceful enjoyment of our tenancy has been seriously disrupted. Although, there may not be a law to protect us from difficult, unpleasant, and disagreeable property owners, we are protected under Civil Code 1942(a) from harassment, retaliatory evictions, and our right to privacy.
We assume this notice will be sufficient grounds to immediately correct this unacceptable behavior and situation. Furthermore, we demand that you cease and desist from talking to our neighbors about our personal and financial situation, spreading malicious and slanderous rumors and acknowledge that we are the rightful tenants at 203 Bellefontaine.
All correspondence will need to be mailed directly to us at the Bellefontaine address, as we will not accept harassing phone calls when your office finally agrees to let us have a critically needed telephone.
We look forward to a response at your earliest convenience.
Sincerely,
Luis David Corrales
Cc: Honorable Jack Scott
Honorable Carol Liu
Honorable Bill Bogaard
Honorable Steve Madison
Honorable Maria Contreras-Sweet
Director Jeff Morales
Tony Harris
Brice D. Paris
Teresa Cota Arias
Doug Failing
Jimmy S. Li
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