Posted on 07/15/2007 3:28:23 PM PDT by BBell
In 1996, the St. Tammany Parish Sheriff's Office mailed a paltry $1.63 property tax bill for the Slidell-area home of Kermit and Dolores Atwood that never reached its destination.
The seemingly innocuous, misaddressed bill was the start of a bizarre legal ordeal that threatens to leave the elderly couple homeless and now stands at the door of the state Supreme Court.
The chain of events that followed the wayward property tax bill, including the eventual sale of the home at a sheriff's tax sale, is described by Dolores Atwood as "seven years of emotional hell."
"I don't know how much more I can endure," said Atwood, 69, while sitting in a FEMA trailer in front of her Katrina-ravaged brick home on Dauphine Street, just north of Slidell.
"I wake up in the middle of the night, and it's on my mind," she said. "All this should have never happened."
But it did, all because of the $1.63 tax bill that Atwood and her husband, Kermit, never received. And they still face the threat of losing their property because of the bill, which was mailed to a defunct address in late 1996 and returned undelivered to the Sheriff's Office.
The couple cling to the hope that recent state court decisions, which say their home should never have been put up for a tax sale, withstand further appeals by a land company tenaciously pursuing a lawsuit to obtain the property.
The Atwoods' nightmare began when they learned in 2000 that their four-bedroom, two-bath home had been sold in 1997 through a tax sale for the $1.63 in unpaid taxes, plus 10 cents interest and $125 in costs associated with the sale.
(Excerpt) Read more at blog.nola.com ...
This is unbelievable. Someone thought they had a deal buying a house and land for $126.73.
These poeple are the lowest form of predatory scum! They really need an "Come to Sopranos" moment to make them see clearly.
I find it hard to believe that they had never been issued a summons or some other notification of the impending sheriff’s sale. Around here it takes a lot to get to that point. There’s a lot here where the owner supposedly died in Viet Nam and taxes haven’t been paid since.
This democrat party insider tax scam is common, but rarely so blatant.
LOL! How is that for a rule-based answer to this farce.
You are all heart, Mr. Lindsay.
What I do not understand about this story is why the couple owed any tax at all. From the article:
The house, which the couple has owned mortgage-free since 1968, previously was totally state homestead exempt, meaning there was no tax bill, Atwood said. The couple's mailing address during that time changed from a rural route and mailbox number to 4122 Dauphine St. because of the implementation of the parish's 911 emergency phone system. The tax bill mailed to the rural route address was returned as undeliverable to the Sheriff's Office which, after advertisements of delinquent taxes in the parish's legal journal, put the property on the auction block.
Did the address change remove the homestead exemption?
what I want to know is how the sherriff’s office who are the primary users of the new addresses implemented because of the 911 system was unable to put the correct address on the bill in the first place...
Good point. The incident does not inspire confidence in the sheriff, the 911 system, or government in general.
It's about power and control.
This article makes it clear.
Yeah. They didn’t even know they owed $1.63 on a debt-free property since 1968 and never had to pay property taxes before. Disgusting, what a bunch of greedy, amoral bastards.
I was intending on buying some property in Wyoming through James Land Co, but will never deal with them. They’ve now lost any commission from me.
Every facet of government can seem to find a tax delinquent in the blink of an eye but they can’t find 12 to 20 million ILLEGALS! BS!
“It’s not about money.
It’s about power and control.
This article makes it clear.”
Well if you have the money you have the power and the control.
“Every facet of government can seem to find a tax delinquent in the blink of an eye but they can’t find 12 to 20 million ILLEGALS! BS!”
No kidding.
Do you think Jamie Land Co and James Land Co are the same?
Maybe it’s a husband and wife team.
It sounds to easy here to sell someone’s house and land out from under them. I agree with you, you’d think they would have to post a notice on their door or at least track the owners down through existing files at the court house.
After my mother died in another state, I found out that the county tax authority had told the Post Office not to forward their tax bills. When I put the house up for sale with a real estate company, the salesman called back in a couple of days and asked if I knew that the house was going to be sold for taxes! He paid the taxes that day.
I went through something similar for “unpaid school taxes” in Bastrop County Texas -— unpaid because of incompetent appraisal officials, their joke of appraisal board leadership and their greedy and reprehensible legal representatives. I would have gladly given them the property except for the process that had to be followed to do so. If I lived in either Bastrop or Fayette County Texas, I would be as big a thorn as I possibly could be in my dealings with them.
“The incident does not inspire confidence in the sheriff, the 911 system, or government in general.”
Last year a couple of county police officers showed up at my door claiming to have had a “911 hang-up” from a phone supposedly listed to my address in their Enhanced 911 system. Neither of us had been near the phone and I’d never heard of the number he quoted as being mine.
Somebody somewhere might have been in serious trouble and not gotten any help.
The government needs to get this settled, at no cost to the elderly couple. If they, the government, has to cough up a settlement with the current land owner leach, then so be it. This should have never gone as far as it has. Ridiculous.
Sure it’s about money, it’s theft. Who but a greedy dishonest scumbag could buy a house and land for $126.00 and NOT know they were stealing it from this elderly couple?
You think everything is about power and control, sometimes it’s just stealing.
What's equally incredible is that these owners either paid subsequent tax bills, or haven't, and never wondered why?
Underlying the entire scam however, is that they were expected to prove a negative: that they never received a tax bill.
One final thought. All state laws should require every process that can result in outrageous consequences, like losing one's home, to be noticed via registered mail, and proof of receipt to be required prior to further action.
Among the 5 most essential laws everywhere, I would think, should be one dealing with bureaucratic criminal incompetence.
This is rich. Let’s say any one of us are elderly and lived through Katrina. Then, there we are, “sitting in a FEMA trailer in front of (our) Katrina-ravaged brick home on Dauphine Street, just north of Slidell.” We learn by-the-by that our family home for 40 years has already been sold out from under us for $126 and we never knew about anything?
Damn.
Reminds be of the carpetbagger scene in Gone with the Wind, when the wounded soldiers were dragging along by the side of the road trying to get home. Those to yokels were singing “Marching through Georgia.”
God bless and help those folks in NO
Oops should have read two yokels
The greedy, dishonest scumbag is the taxing authority.>Whomever bought it played by the rules set up by the greedy, dishonest scumbag.
ditto...I’ve bought property at tax sales before...the old adage of “caveat emptor” is most necessary to follow in those cases...
Seems like a pretty simple case, if I’m the Supreme Court.
So simple that the Supreme Court should simply refuse to hear it. The lower courts ruled in the home owner's favor. It is the land company that wants to string this along, apparently to squeeze a settlement out of the home owner.
Sometimes I ponder what it would have been like to live 100, 150, 200 years ago in what are now these United States - the government essentially gave away land, 160 acres worth, as long as one made improvements and lived there.
Railroads got a real sweetheart deal. Something like a 20 mile “right of way” swath along with the actual roadbed. But to think there were huge areas still that were more or less unexplored not all that long ago.
Yep, the S.Ct. could easily simply deny cert. and put an end to this. That’s probably what I’d do if I were them.
I met a lot of the landed poor in the Ozarks before the property and scool taxes drove them off of their land and into the welfare state. Most of them were good people who only wanted to be left alone.
Re: “They really need an “Come to Sopranos” moment to make them see clearly.”
Brings to mind when T had his boat stoked with stereo speakers and he had his minions blast loud muzak at some slimeball that was living in a beach front house.
Here, a sheriff walks up and knocks on your door and hands it to you personally. They aren't mailed out.
her did not pay her taxes... didn't his ear hurt when he said this?
Reminds me more of the moment throws the dirt in the man’s face and says, “This is all of Tara you’ll ever get.”
“Most of them were good people who only wanted to be left alone.” (We’ll have none of that around here!) /s
You should call and tell them your reasoning. Maybe they will change after this bad publicity.
Who are almost all tax delinquent to the tune of billions BTW. This "Sheriff" should be riding a rail with his new found tar and feather overcoat. Blackbird.
What I can’t understand is that James Land Company bought it from American Land Sales just one month after the Sherriffs auction back in 1997.
But they never inspected the property or tried to sell it, just sat on it for 3 years until the reclamation period ran out, and never attempted to check on the status to see if the owners were going to reclaim it ?
And why are they trying to get a settlement from the owners instead of American Land Sales who they bought it from ?
I thought a notice of impending Sherriff’s sale would have to be hand-delivered and tacked to the front door of the property.
How can your house be sold out from under you with nobody ever coming to your door ?
Mr. Lindsay, meet Mr. Ken McElroy.
The street they’re on isn’t that farfrom a lot of suburbs. Lots of development going on nearby. Though the street they’re on is rather small, it’s right off of I-59 though you can’t get to it from the interstate.
In May 2006, State District Judge Patricia Hedges ruled that the property title belongs to the Atwoods. Jamie Land appealed.
Last month, a three-judge panel of the state 1st Circuit Court of Appeal upheld Hedges’ decision. Jamie Land asked the court to rehear the case, but that request was denied last week.
Now, the company plans to ask the Louisiana Supreme Court to take up the case.
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/070717/koddities/oddity_miniscule_tax_bill
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.