Housing Authority Seeks To Boot 86-Year Old Tenant; Son Sold Drugs On Property, Say Officials

In Bucks County, Pennsylvania, the Bucks County Courier Times reports:

• Officials said Belle Perry violated her lease because her son sold drugs on the property. The Bucks County Housing Authority has filed paperwork to evict an 86-year-old woman from her federally subsidized home in Venice Ashby because officials say her son sold drugs on the property, among other lease violations.(1)

***

• Police records of the Aug. 20 drug arrest state that her son, Sylvester Perry, sold a small amount of drugs to another man on the 1600 block of Foster Avenue Circle. Belle Perry lives in that block. Sylvester Perry is in prison on $40,000 bail awaiting an October hearing on those charges. On Aug. 26, the housing authority filed a complaint seeking Belle Perry's eviction.

***

• "Its disturbing that an 86-year-old woman would be evicted and given less than 72 hours to leave for something her son allegedly did and he doesn't even live there," Philadelphia attorney L. Kenneth Chotiner said Friday. Chotiner, a former Philadelphia Housing Authority attorney, said he advised Belle Perry to file for bankruptcy to try to stave off the eviction. [Daughter] Bobbie Perry said she filed for bankruptcy on behalf of her mother Friday morning.

For the story, see 86-year-old woman fights eviction.

(1) In court records, the authority states that Belle Perry violated her lease by allowing drug-related activity on her premises, allowing herself, tenants and guests to disturb the peace, failing to maintain decent, safe and sanitary conditions, allowing herself, tenants and guests to engage in illegal, unlawful or disorderly conduct, and allowing drug-related criminal activity, according to court records.