Pamela Becker, a 63 year old NYC tenant has figured out (for the time being) a way to keep her ands on a much sought after rent controlled 2 bedroom apartment in the gritty up and coming inner city suburb of Long Island City for only $100 a month.
At 63 years old, Pamela Becker – who now calls herself ‘Maria DeTommaso‘ – had herself legally adopted by an elderly retired dock worker so his $100-a-month, rent-controlled, two-bedroom apartment would go to her, the man’s ‘daughter.’
Becker now is battling the couple who owns the building – who claim she has no right to live in the apartment at its rent-controlled price – in Queens Housing Court over whether she has any right to the apartment.
Told Sugrim Outar, who owns the small apartment building with his wife via the New York Post: ‘She has made my life a living hell.’
According to Pamela Becker, she first came to the apartment building in the 1990s as a cat-sitter for a tenant.
At some point, the former yoga instructor befriended Nicholas DeTommaso and soon found herself receiving ‘gifts’ from the man.
Neighbors told the UK’s dailymail Pamela Becker would often take the old man shopping and spend time with him. Soon after, he started treating her, gifting her expecting items, including a ‘series of cars.’
By 2002, Becker had officially moved in with the older man, who in 2007 was diagnosed with dementia, at which point Becker was granted power of attorney for the ailing former dock worker.
As the person in charge of making all of his financial and legal decisions, Pamela Becker became the beneficiary of his life insurance policy and his pension.
Nevertheless despite calls she should marry the man, she declined.
‘Some people said I should marry him. I didn’t want to marry him, that’s gross. I don’t do stuff like that,’ Becker told the Post.
Rather, Becker had herself legally adopted by DeTommaso just weeks before his June 2009 death. At the time the senile man was 85 years old.
Since DeTommaso’s death, Becker has continued to live in the apartment – and pay the meagerly $100-a-month rent.
Long Island City’s proximity to Manhattan – one subway stop from Grand Central Station in midtown – as well as the construction of a collection of luxury high-rise apartment buildings over the last decade has rental prices in the area easily fetching over $2700 far similar 2 bedroom apartments in the open market.
The Outars were forced to withdraw their lawsuit against Becker due to technical issues. Sugrim Outar, however, says he plans to try and have Becker evicted from his property.
That said Becker has no plans of budging, claiming she legally seceded in coming to the apartment. A point that the owner who lives directly above her continues to challenge.
‘She was only legally adopted by him for only 22 days before he died,‘ told Outar.
Responded Pamela Becker: ‘I’m legally adopted,’
‘I’m going to win this battle.’
And here is a comment that I came across via the gothamist from an earlier written article that literally made my jaw drop. Have a read and see what you think?
Here is the letter I wrote to the papers begging them to pick it up:I live next to a diabolical genius with unbelievable political connections…a woman who can get anything, and I mean anything done. She has taken over our building, a building she does not own, but in the eyes of the City and Mayor Bloomberg, she is our overlord and not one to be messed with.
She collects every government benefit you can image. She practices yoga every day and runs a “school” she calls the Yoga Tea Room, yet has a handicapped placard that allows her to park anywhere, anytime. She professes on Manta to earn upwards of $100k per year, yet collects government disability and medical benefits. She has zero physical disability. She has received dozens and dozens of insurance company payouts for everything you can image. Her car is “stolen” around every two years or so and is usually found many months later abandoned…after she receives her check from the insurance company.
She lives in a railroad with 3 rooms and kitchen and bath. She has not paid the landlord rent in 3 years. He is unable to evict her due to her political connections. She is around 60 years old, yet managed to get the rent controlled tenant who used to live there to adopt her two weeks before he died. He could not recognize his real family members and was basically a vegetable at the time of the signing of documents. The courts approved it, nevertheless. She claimed succession rights to get the apartment. Again, since taking ownership, she has not paid rent in 3 years. She has partitioned the three rooms and rents each one out for anywhere from $100-$150 per week. She rents to ex-convicts, borderline homeless people, transients, illegals, basically anyone who has the cash to pay her. After she collects their money (always cash), she kicks them out before their “time” is up. In the last year, she has kicked at least a half a dozen people out in the middle of the night. The people are often afraid of the police for one reason or another and so usually leave without making a fuss. One woman, who was illegal, cried when her stuff was thrown on the sidewalk around midnight one night.
She recently rented to a guy named Monty. She tried to kick him out before his time was up and he flatly refused to leave. The police have been at our home around 20 times since mid-December. One morning at 6am, she starting screaming so tenants would think he was killing her. We were terrified and really thought she was being stabbed to death. When the police came, the guy showed them phone footage of him standing there recording her while she was screaming. She claimed he beat her up. There was not a scratch or bump or mark on her. This has happened at least 10 times since then. Monty fought the good fight. She took him to housing court and forged documents saying she was the landlord and was evicting him for non payment. The case was stayed until March. Yesterday, Mayor Bloomberg ordered the police to remove him from the premises. You thought only a housing court judge could evict, right? Wrong.
She has tried to change the main locks on the building to keep the tenants from coming in. She leaves her garbage in the hallways and sweeps all of the dirt from her apartment into there too. She yells at tenants when they leave their apartments. Why does she get away with all this you ask? Her brother is the mayor of Salt Lake City, UT. Her father was the Ambassador to Honduras under a former President. Everyone in her family is politically connected, and they will do anything to keep her in that apartment.I could go on for days, but I would much prefer to talk about this.
Her various names are Pamela Becker, Pamela Feinstein, Prema Deodhar, Pamela Feinstein, Maria Nicola Detomasso. The couple who own the building are elderly people in very poor health. The old lady cries almost daily over how they are being taken advantage of by this beast. The man has had several heart attacks, and this insane woman calls him into her apartment at least once a week to fix something she has destroyed on purpose. She seems to have made it her mission to terrorize these people
This woman needs to be stopped, but after hearing today that Bloomberg’s office ordered the guy (Monty) out and armed men came to remove him, I realize just how powerful she is.
Link to father’s obituary and wiki pagehttp://www.arlingtoncemete…
link to brother’s wiki pagehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wi…
link to her facebook pages http://www.facebook.com/mariad…
http://www.facebook.com/search…
http://www.facebook.com/search…
link to her linkedin profilehttp://www.linkedin.com…
link to her manta page for her business which she says earns her over $100k per year, yet she still collects tons of government benefits http://www.manta.com/g/mr45g9q…
link to her asking about being adopted http://forum.freeadvice.com/me…
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