Just wanted to document the extreme difficulties I encountered with Joyce Cassells, a San Francisco resident who migrated to my Native California from Michigan.
I was Ms. Cassells roommate for 3 years - 1996-1999. The main leasholder did not run a background check prior to permitting Ms. Cassells to move into what was already a phenominal deal for her - $500/mo for a nice two room wing of a 3 bedroom flat that included the garage space — all in a rather nice area of the Sunset of San Francisco.
What neither I nor the main leasholder, Betty Fairchild, an elderly lady and author of the book "Now that you Know", knew (no pun intended) was that Ms. Cassells had been evicted 5 times in 5 years prior to moving in, filed for Chapter 13 the day she arrived and had received a $90,000 student loan after being accepted to a local university's PhD program.
What we didn't know was that Ms. Cassells had been kicked out of a mental health program's housing project run by the Progress Foundation in which public documents showed not even the mental health professionals could handle her. Ms. Cassells had also been evicted by an organization called "Religious Society of Friends" of all things.
It was like something out of the movie Pacific Heights that I would see years later.
Ms. Cassells had a history of mental illness she was in denial of while living with me and Ms. Fairchild.in fact, Ms. Cassells was so mentally ill, that she projected her illness onto her innocent roommates and acted as if she were a scholar without any previous history of difficulties in her life. Ms. Cassells would deliberately provoke, harass and annoy both me and Ms. Fairchild to the point that Ms. Fairchild saw an attorney to draft a letter to request she move. The attorney provided Ms. Fairchild with poor advice, however, failing to do his job to check on Ms. Cassell's evictions that would have made it easy to get her to move.
Ms. Fairchild eventually gave up the lease to Ms. Cassells and I was left to live with someone who also wanted me to move so she could have a lease to a tremendous deal in a tight housing market ($1,250 for a 3 bedroom flat, with 2 car garage and backyard was an insane deal in San Francisco in 1999 where rent for small studios was as high as $1,500/mo.) I wanted to move, but I had such a great deal myself at $325/mo with a nice room in a nice area in an extremely tight housing market, I just tried to stay until I was truly ready to leave.
After the main leaseholder moved, Ms. Cassells filed 20 police reports on me, mostly without my knowledge, when I was off the property. Ms. Cassells would stage messes and take photos of them, accuse me of battery in one ocassion, placing me under "citizens arrest" where I had to go to court to defend her false accusation in which she had no medical evidence of the injury she purportedly had. I was never arrested by the police for Ms. Cassells accusation, they were just always visiting the property.
In one instance when I was on the property, police were called when I was moving in a new fish aquarium I had bought. The police officer remaind on the property 30 minutes and took a seat in the kitchen to annoy me. Ms. Cassells had tried to block the aquarium's delivery and complained I had touched her property during the incident.
I did not know of Ms. Cassell's full history and so I could not provide an adequate defense to police, who saw I had a reckless driving ticket and "evading a peace officer" on my record from 8 years ago at the time. (I had gone to high school with the officer and my conviction happened due to my fear of this individual I tried to escape not due to my breaking in law).
Finally, Ms. Cassells was able to get a 2 foot restraining order against me in hopes to get me to move so she could obtain the lease. She paid an attorney to file a large brief against me in which she rambled on about herself and her fears of me as she did in her Progress Foundation case against professional counselors. I was working late hours at Morrison & Foerster, LLP to pay for her insane legal activities against me.
Further, Ms. Cassells committed obvious perjury on the stand for the judge to witness in claiming she had never had any previous dipustes in her living situations at which time her 5 evictions were placed in front of her. A long pause occurred prior to Ms. Cassells admitting the cases were hers.
Ms. Cassells had demanded jury trials for 2 of her 5 legal convictions. Prior to moving in with me and Ms. Fairchild, she had not paid rent an entire year at the Mary Beth Inn. After she fild Chapter 13, Ms. Cassells paid out some money for rent in a settlement with the Inn, but far lower than what was originally owed.
In Ms. Cassells had a lawsuit filed against her by a credit company for unpaid balance on her credit card.in 2006 Ms. Cassells had another credit company file a case against her for an unpaid credit issue - both cases totaled nearly $5,000 due.instead of paying what was relatively small amounts that most anyone with any level of intelligence, especially on the level of a PhD, could find ways of paying back, Ms. Cassells filed for a second bankruptcy in April.
Ms. Cassells calcluated how long she could string along her creditors until she would be able to file for another bankruptcy. Ms. Cassells also at the age of 62 has no intention of paying back her $90,000 student loan as well that California tax payers such as myself will have to pay for.
Ms. Cassells essentially harassed an elderly leaseholder, Betty Fairchild, to move with little stickers she placed on her door that said "get a life" so she could obtain the lease. Ms. Cassells then filed false police reports on me, violated my privacy, harassed me, spoke to me through the walls of my bedroom when I was on the phone talking to someone else, and was in complete denial she was a problem to anyone.
The police were fully cooperative with every request of Ms. Cassells. On one ocassion, Ms. Cassells reported the police officer, Officer Gerke of the Taraval Police Station, said he would write anything she wanted him to write about me. The reason for this cooperation with Ms. Cassells was I had a personal dispute with a police officer I went to high school with I was afraid of I had gotten an "evasion of peace officer" ticket on my record. I was not evading him for any unlawful activity.
Ms. Cassells showed no criminal record in her history, yet stole thousands upon thousands of dollars from Native California tax payers such as myself, was challenging legal evictions with demands for court trials, was refusing to pay rent for an entire year, all while feeling entitled to obtaining the lease to where the main lease holder, Betty Fairchild, had lived on for 5 years.
Ms. Cassells is a burden to California tax payers, continues to blame others for her problems, commits perjury against innocent people and feels entitlement due to her being a "genuis" as she explained at my restraining order court hearing.
I had never been evicted ever in my life, had excellent landlord references and today my credit is the top 10% of Americans and I live in one of the nicest areas of San Francisco, upper Nob Hill. I was in debt in 2000 to the tune of $10,000 but worked hard to get myself out of debt, long hours at law firms for the past 8 years. I am far from being in debt today.
In 6, Ms. Cassells wasn't willing to get another job or find creative ways to pay off a mere $5,000 she owed credit card companies. That speaks volumes of what a lazy, pathetic sack of shit this individual is - she has a criminally calculating mind to use credit companies, maxing out her credit until she could file for a second bankruptcy. This nutcase also cost me $4,000 in legal fees to defend myself from her outrageous accusations. Such a scholar. Such a genius.
For more information on my experiences, please see the movie Pacific Heights.
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