Swamplot Archives by Tag: Crime

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Neighborhood Watch Signs: Threat or Menace?

March 18, 2009 – 10:52 am
   

“I live in a subdivision (ex-urb) in the Greater Houston Area. My neighbors and I are thinking about organizing a Neighborhood Watch program for our subdivision. We are a newer subdivision, with many houses left to build and sell. We want to purchase and place Neighborhood Watch signs along some of the streets in our subdivision. Now here is our dilemma: will putting up these signs scare off new home buyers? Or will it give them confidence in our communities’ security by knowing we have an active NW program? We certainly don’t want to scare off new buyers with our signs, but at the same time, we want to send a message to the bad guys that our subdivision is on watch for them.” [Swamplot inbox]

10:52 am | 9 Comments | Read more about Crime, Quicklink
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Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Forget It, Jake. It’s Asiatown

March 4, 2009 – 11:49 am
   

The Chronicle quietly debuts that new, more inclusive name for the pan-Asian strip along Bellaire Blvd. between 59 and Highway 6 formerly known as Chinatown: Asiatown. A recent email describing marauding, gun-toting, and noodle-slurping gangs in the area is wrong: “Janet Chiu, manager of Tan Tan, one of the purportedly robbed restaurants, said the tales caused business to drop by 20 percent. ‘It’s more Dead Town than Asiatown,’ she complained, voicing a strident denial that her cafe had been robbed.” [Houston Chronicle]

11:49 am | Add a Comment | Read more about Crime, Neighborhoods: Alief, Neighborhoods: Chinatown, Quicklink, Real Estate Marketing
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Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Last Organic Outpost: The Motion Picture

February 24, 2009 – 11:48 am

Last year Transit Antenna, a 7-person “mobile living experiment,” camped out at Joe Nelson Icet’s Last Organic Outpost, did a little farming, and painted the giant “FARMART” mural at the top of the adjacent Comet rice mill. The group, which travels the country on a city bus converted to run on waste vegetable oil, documented its visit — which included a stint in the Art Car Parade — in a series of website posts.

And not long after the rambling group left its urban campground, Transit Antenna’s Seth Gadsden posted this half-hour documentary the group put together about goings-on at the Emile St. farm and its Fifth Ward neighborhood. An HD version is also available.

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11:48 am | 1 Comment | Read more about Crime, Landscape, Neighborhoods: Fifth Ward, Transportation
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Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Feds Now Raiding Stanford Financial Group Offices in the Galleria

February 17, 2009 – 11:46 am

From the New York Times website this morning:

Shortly after 10 a.m. Central time, about 40 police officers and other law enforcement officials simultaneously entered Stanford Group’s two office buildings in Houston. Many of the law enforcement personnel carried large black briefcases. Stanford group’s headquarters are in two offices in Houston, one within a tower of the Houston Galleria shopping mall, and the other across the street.

Photo of Stanford Financial Group Offices, 5050 Westheimer: Stanford Financial Group

11:46 am | 5 Comments | Read more about Crime, Fraud, Neighborhoods: Galleria
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Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Lights Out for Candlelight Trails?

October 15, 2008 – 4:36 pm

Candlelight Trails Condominiums, 5500 DeSoto St., Inwood Forest, Houston

City building officials closed down the Candlelight Trails condo complex in northwest Houston 14 months ago, citing substandard living conditions. But neighbors have still been complaining about squatters and crime. Now the Chronicle’s Matt Stiles reports that city attorneys have filed a lawsuit asking a judge to allow them to demolish it:

the complex technically is a condominium property, so the city has to sue 150 owners to get authority to tear the property down. The City Council is set to vote this week to hire a law firm for those cases.

Candlelight Trails sits on 11 acres in the 5500 and 5600 blocks of DeSoto, off Antoine north of Tidwell.

Photo of Candlelight Trails: Matt Stiles

4:36 pm | 7 Comments | Read more about Condos, Crime, Demolitions, Neighborhood Disputes, Neighborhoods: Candlelight Trails, Neighborhoods: Inwood Forest
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Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Gates of River Oaks Photo Tour

September 10, 2008 – 9:39 am

Driveway Gate of a Home in River Oaks, Houston, Texas

Joni Webb takes Cote de Texas readers on a driving tour of River Oaks houses, and reports:

. . . slowly yet surely, River Oaks has become a gated community of sorts without anyone realizing it. Instead of the one set of gates leading into the neighborhood, house after house is located behind their own iron gates now. Until my latest drive through, I hadn’t realized how many houses were gated in what was once a more accessible neighborhood. In America, we tend to think of gated communities as being far away, out in the suburbs, a place where people take flight against a rising crime rate. But here, in River Oaks, in the heart of the city, in the shadow of our downtown, this community has chosen to hide themselves behind formidable walls, and thus, have changed the look and atmosphere of one of our treasures.

Selections from Webb’s “exclusive” photo collection:

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9:39 am | 2 Comments | Read more about Crime, Home Design, Neighborhoods: River Oaks
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Monday, July 14, 2008

Oak Creek Village Meth Lab: Strong Enough To Kill Plants

July 14, 2008 – 11:32 am
   

“The first firefighter who went inside had to be carried out by two others because he was overcome by the fumes. Investigators say something was so strong that it killed trees and grass adjacent to the garage.” Following the strange but apparently contradictory laws of TeeVee and web journalism, the print version of the report removes all references to the name of the neighborhood and the street address. (It’s 15022 Falling Creek Dr., Oak Creek Village, just north of FM 1960). [abc13]

11:32 am | 1 Comment | Read more about Crime, Neighborhoods: FM 1960, Neighborhoods: Oak Creek Village, Quicklink
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Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Finding Hidden Value in the Tremont Tower

June 24, 2008 – 5:00 pm

Tremont Tower, 3311 Yupon St., Houston

It didn’t garner much local attention, but a certain local condo building — along with a few close friends — made a star appearance in last week’s big mortgage-scam announcement by the FBI. More than 400 people were charged in 144 separate mortgage fraud cases nationwide over the last 3 months as part of the agency’s “Operation Malicious Mortgage.” Six of those arrests were in Houston:

This indictment charges Houston-area residents Frankthea Annette Williams, Ishmael Boyd Laryea, Charles Joseph-DeShawn Wilson, Kristen Anne Way and Robert Wilfred Stanley, and Tasha Rene Bellow, of Burbank, Calif., with engaging in a scheme to defraud by providing false and fraudulent information to residential lenders to induce the lenders to fund the purchase of single family homes and condominium units.

11 News reporter Allison Triarsi describes how the scams worked:

The suspects would find a home for sale, let’s say $200,000.

They would then get a phony appraisal that would almost double the home’s actual value. In that case, $400,000.

The culprits would then look for an investor. That’s someone to actually put the house in their name using their good credit for the closing and title.

A bank would then loan the money for the house, which has the phony appraisal value. The crooks would then pay the seller the $200,000 asking price and pocket the other $200,000.

Here’s a question. If you were trying to run this scam, where would you find properties you could get appraised for as much as twice their actual value? Sure, Houston had some price runups . . . and yes, appraisals can be played. But why fake something you don’t have to?

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5:00 pm | 9 Comments | Read more about Buying and Selling, Condos, Crime, Financing, Neighborhoods: Montrose
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Monday, June 2, 2008

Open Houses in Candlewood Glen

June 2, 2008 – 10:40 am

Open House at Candlewood Glen Apartments, Houston

Chronicle reporter Matt Stiles continues his tour of substandard Houston apartments, stopping this week for a visit at the 172-unit Candlewood Glen Apartments, near the 5400 block of DeSoto:

Now, only about 12 units remain legally occupied, and the management office is shuttered. Rotting trash sits in piles. Copper pipes and air conditioners’ coils have been ripped on a mass scale from burglarized units. The swimming pool is filled with water the color of crude oil.

“It’s just a horrible place,” said Roy Millmore, executive director of the Near Northwest Management District, an organization that focuses on reducing crime in the area.

The poor conditions inside the complex have persisted for months, in part because many of the property’s 43 fourplexes are owned by out-of-state investors, rather than a single owner. That makes applying pressure to improve conditions more complicated for city inspectors.

Still, code inspectors had not visited the property in a decade until the Houston Chronicle documented its conditions. City officials say they had not received complaints from people living there and that they are trying to enforce codes more aggressively than in years past.

After the jump: Stiles’s Candlewood Glen Apartments photo tour. Plus: Available now!

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10:40 am | Add a Comment | Read more about Apartments, Condos, Crime, Foreclosures, Hazards, Neighborhoods: Candlewood Glen, Neighborhoods: Inwood Forest
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Thursday, April 17, 2008

West Oaks Mall Bankruptcy Sale: JCPenneys on the Dollar

April 17, 2008 – 10:08 pm

An update on the 1031-exchange debacle surrounding the West Oaks Mall: In March, the mysterious Edward Okun — the mall’s owner — was indicted by a Virginia grand jury on charges of mail fraud, for misappropriating $132 million invested in his 1031 exchange company, 1031 Tax Group — along with bulk cash smuggling and related charges. Days later, Okun was arrested in his home on Hibiscus Island in Miami Beach.

To the 340 investors who had trusted $150 million of their 1031-exchange funds to supposedly-qualified intermediaries controlled by Okun, this was good news. But it doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll get their money back — or find a way around the huge tax liability now associated with their failed exchanges.

The 1031-exchange investors in Okun’s 1031 Tax Group had hoped to recoup some of their missing funds by raiding Okun’s other assets — including the West Oaks Mall. But the Okun-controlled companies that owned the mall declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy in October.

Today, the Costar Group reports that the freestanding building formerly known as JCPenney at the West Oaks Mall has been put up for sale, along with a mall in Salina, Kansas. The trustee in the bankruptcy case has hired Keen Realty, the new real estate division of KPMG Corporate Finance, to market both properties.

10:08 pm | 1 Comment | Read more about Crime, Financing, Fraud, Malls, Neighborhoods: Alief
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Monday, April 14, 2008

Low-Rent Apartment Complexes are Hot!

April 14, 2008 – 11:25 am

Fire at Compton Courts Apartments, 419 Richey Rd., Pasadena, Texas, April 11, 2008Reflecting on the recent attention drawn to State Rep. Hubert Vo’s tenement-quality apartment complexes — as well as three more local value-priced apartment structures that burst into flames over the last few days — local blogger Slampo says the quintessential Houston residence is finally getting the attention it deserves:

We’ve long contended—in barrooms, on Metro buses, while walking our dog late at night—that the signature Houston residence is not the River Oaks mansion or the Heights cottage or the Westbury suburban rambler or the Randall Davis “loft” apartment or the Pulte Home in the Outer East Jesus Subdivision (we just love the ones with paddle boats on the man-made “lakes”) but rather the one- or two-bedroom unit in a two-story complex, usually but not always situated outside The Loop, that was constructed anytime from the late 1960s through mid-’80s and whose population typically has gone through one or more pronounced demographic shifts: say, from all-white to mixed to mostly black to predominantly Hispanic . . .

Slampo also makes note that Houston Chronicle readers online have taken up reporter Matt Stiles’s suggestion to identify similar “problem properties” around town:

The finely detailed and descriptive comments affixed to Stiles’ posting confirm that there’s nothing like the topic of “crappy apartments” to arouse the local populace. You don’t have to be a really perceptive sort to see that many of the bright-line social divisions in Houston—over crime, schools, “changing” neighborhoods—neatly align with the divide between apartment renters and owners of single-family homes and townhouses (and while race and/or ethnicity is a factor in these divisions, class is the underpinning). This is partly due to the proximity of subdivisions to sprawling complexes, a phenomenon that we assume is somehow linked to the city’s lack of zoning (but one that, come to think of it, we’ve noticed in other, newer-type Sunbelt cities). But mostly it’s because landlords allow these places to go down the toilet and become magnets for crime and gangs.

After the jump, that list of low-cost apartments Chronicle readers have come up with. And some of them still have vacancies!

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11:25 am | 1 Comment | Read more about Apartments, Crime, Hazards
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Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Mecom Fountain: Nighttime Photo Opportunities Return

March 4, 2008 – 9:01 am

Mecom Fountain, Main and Montrose, Houston

If you’ve been waiting for your chance to take the perfect dramatic nighttime photo of the Mecom Fountain, act now! The fountain at the middle of the five-way intersection of Main, Montrose, and Hermann Dr. is currently bubble-bath-free and lights up properly at night, thanks to a more-than-$100,000 renovation effort approved by City Council back in November and completed last week.

Back in the fall of 2006, someone had stolen the 264 bronze canisters and light bulbs that lit up the fountains. After staying in the dark for months, it got some help more recently . . . with floodlights from high atop Hotel ZaZa. Maybe now those floods can be turned into motion detectors!

Security measures to protect the Mecom Fountain lights will include additional surveillance by the Houston Police Department, the Hotel ZaZa and the Houston Parks and Recreation Department.

After the jump, photos of the fountain lit up the way it was and how it’s supposed to be, plus a view of the Hermann Park beauty taking a bath.

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9:01 am | Read more about Crime, Neighborhoods: Hermann Park, Neighborhoods: Museum District, Nightlife, Public Art
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Thursday, February 7, 2008

Fraud Scheme Investigation: Eternal Vigilance Is the Price of Low-Doc Loans

February 7, 2008 – 10:54 am

FSI Trailer

It’s not just a burgeoning problem that’s destroying neighborhoods and creating havoc in the real-estate market: Mortgage fraud is now also the target of over-the-top TV-show parodies. Yes, “FSI: Fraud Scheme Investigation” is . . . a training video for bored mortgage professionals — or anyone who’s suspicious (or wants to be) that he may be surrounded by unlawful real-estate hijinx.

But really, “FSI” is so much more than that. Designed for “maximum employee learning retention,” the DVD has been a runaway hit for Interthinx, a company that ordinarily provides risk mitigation and compliance tools for the financial-services industry, but occasionally breaks out of that mold to film comedy-dramas like this or its predecessor, “Desperate House Lies.”

But wait, there’s more!

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10:54 am | Read more about Crime, Mortgages
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Wednesday, January 30, 2008

Historic Preservation, Meet Self Preservation

January 30, 2008 – 12:35 pm

1704 Kipling St., HoustonNot all recipients of the 2008 GHPA Good Brick Awards will be able to attend this Friday’s historic-preservation awards banquet at the River Oaks Country Club, but some will have better excuses than others. Ken Rice, who along with Sarah Goodpastor will receive an award for the renovation of a 1930 brick duplex at the corner of Kipling and Dunlavy, won’t be able to make it because he’s currently serving a 27-month sentence in federal prison for securities fraud.

Yes, that’s former Enron Broadband CEO and architecture patron Kenneth Rice, who already helped lessen his sentence by testifying against other Enron executives in two separate trials after his 2003 guilty plea. Rice agreed to forfeit more than $13.7 million worth of cash investments, real estate, cars, and jewelry as part of his plea agreement. His sentence included a $50,000 fine.

Rice, 48, could end up serving less than half of his prison term, though.

His lawyers say he hopes to enter a drug and alcohol treatment program available to nonviolent federal inmates that, if completed, could shave up to a year from his term. In addition, federal inmates can reduce their prison time by 15 percent with good behavior. With those two combined, Rice could get out of prison in 11 months.

After the jump, details and photos of a project Rice is likely hoping will count towards that good-behavior credit.

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12:35 pm | Read more about Crime, Historic Preservation, Home Design, Houston Architects, Interiors, Neighborhoods: Winlow Place, Renovations
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Monday, January 28, 2008

Astrodome Future: Whole Lot Brighter Once You Scratch Surface

January 28, 2008 – 12:37 pm

If you were wondering why the four-year effort to redevelop the Astrodome seemed like it was being run by the Keystone Kops, here’s a small piece of information that might start to explain a few things: Michael Surface, who up until a few weeks ago was chairman of the Harris County Sports and Convention Corp., has been indicted on corruption charges:

In order to secure business from the city of Houston, prosecutors allege, Schatte and Surface bribed Monique McGilbra, the city’s director of building services under then-Mayor Lee Brown, and hired her boyfriend, Garland Hardeman, as a consultant.

McGilbra pleaded guilty in 2005 to accepting bribes and has cooperated with prosecutors on the indictment.

According to the indictment, Schatte, 59, and Surface, 47, gave McGilbra free use of Schatte’s California condo, tickets to professional football games and a box containing champagne and $1,000 in cash. They also paid Hardeman more than $40,000 in consulting fees — $7,800 of which he funneled to McGilbra.

This is, of course, the same Michael Surface who decided to run a “competition” for the right to redevelop the Astrodome more than four years ago with this screwy premise: Ideas would only be considered if they were proposed by developers who had experience with projects of a similar size; but developers with experience on projects of a similar size would not be considered unless their ideas were considered acceptable. And yes, he’s the same Michael Surface who kept pushing the “winner” of the competition — Astrodome Redevelopment Corp. — to change its proposal from a space-themed amusement park to a convention hotel. And who gave them, during all that time, exclusive rights to negotiate a deal.

It’s not so surprising that new proposals for the Dome have begun to leak out in the few short weeks since Surface abruptly resigned his HCSCC post.

12:37 pm | Read more about Crime, Development Strategy, Neighborhoods: Reliant Park, Public Buildings
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