Sexually Harassed in Their Homes: When Bay Area Renters Accuse Landlords of Exploitation

By Marisa Kendall
Mercury News
April 5, 2018

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/business/article208000214.html

Cindy Chau seemed to have it made. She paid $1,200 a month for a rent-controlled, one bedroom apartment in San Francisco – a city where tenants regularly shell out nearly three times that.

But Chau alleges living there came with a hidden cost not spelled out in any lease – a property manager who bombarded her with sexual text messages and persistent come-ons, once propositioning her in her own home while he was supposed to be fixing her sink.

"I just couldn't go back to living there," Chau said. "I didn't feel safe."

While the #MeToo movement has shed light on workplace sexual harassment in California's technology sector, entertainment industry, politics and beyond, little attention is paid to the same abuses between landlords and tenants. But tenants-rights lawyers say the harassment Bay Area women are reporting – from unwanted touching to offers of free rent in exchange for sex – is particularly chilling because it involves someone with keys to the victim's home and the power to take that home away. And with local rent prices soaring, many women can't put an end to the harassment by moving out, because they can't afford to live anywhere else.

"It's a huge problem everywhere," said Oakland-based attorney Leslie Levy, who represents plaintiffs in sexual harassment cases, "particularly striking low-income tenants, women who are on Section 8 housing, immigrant women – because they are the most vulnerable, and they can't just up and move."

Experts say it's difficult to tell how widespread landlord-tenant sexual harassment is because tenants often don't report it and research on the subject is lacking. But it's an issue that's caught the attention of the nation's highest civil rights enforcers – in October the Department of Justice launched a pilot program to target sexual harassment in housing, starting in Washington D.C. and western Virginia.

Of the housing complaints filed in California in 2016, 2 percent, or 22 out of 1,006, involved sexual harassment, according to the state Department of Fair Employment and Housing. But experts say that's just the tip of the iceberg.

"I think it's safe to say this is a lot more common than the numbers reveal," said Kevin Kish, director of the California's Department of Fair Employment and Housing.

Chau, a 39-year-old contractor for Facebook, says she lived for nine years without issue in her top-floor apartment in San Francisco's Sea Cliff neighborhood, blocks from the Legion of Honor. Then in 2015 Gregg Molyneaux, her landlords' son and new property manager, moved into the unit below hers.

Molyneaux, who was in his 60s, began harassing her soon after, Chau alleges in a September lawsuit she filed against him and his parents in San Francisco County Superior Court, for claims including sexual harassment, wrongful eviction, violating San Francisco's rent ordinance and breach of warranty. In frequent text messages, he called her "hot stuff" and "sexy," and asked to spend "private time" with her in her apartment, according to copies of the messages reviewed by this news organization.

Once, while he was in her apartment to fix a clogged sink and broken stove, Molyneaux told Chau he'd like to come up and have sex with her sometime, according to the lawsuit. On another occasion, after shaking her hand, he pulled her in close as if for a kiss, Chau claims.

In an interview, Molyneaux denied trying to kiss Chau but acknowledged sending her provocative text messages and propositioning her in her apartment.

"I admit, as a manager I should not be that forward with one of the tenants," he said. "And I did not realize that."

Molyneaux and his parents threatened to evict Chau last year because she stopped paying rent, he said, but she ultimately moved out voluntarily. In her lawsuit, Chau counters she was forced out as retaliation for refusing Molyneaux's advances and complaining about ongoing maintenance issues.

Chau says she tried to ignore Molyneaux's come-ons, asking him to refrain from making inappropriate comments and even suggesting he start a Tinder profile, but nothing worked. So she began timing when she left her apartment to avoid running into him. But she felt uncomfortable even while inside her apartment, knowing he could hear her every footstep from the floor below.

Chau says she was hesitant to complain to her landlords, both of whom were in their 90s, because she feared they might kick her out, and she worried she couldn't afford a market-rate apartment.

"I needed a place to stay, and rent was affordable," Chau said, "and I didn't know what else to do."

That's a common mindset among Bay Area tenants facing harassment in one of the nation's most expensive housing markets, said Jacqueline Ravenscroft, who represents Chau and two other local tenants suing different landlords for sexual harassment.

"Tenants basically are captive because they can't afford to move out," Ravenscroft said.

The average monthly rent for a one-bedroom apartment in San Francisco is $3,239, according to RentCafe. It's $2,367 in San Jose, and $2,226 in Oakland.

Chau says she eventually did complain to her landlords about the harassment and nothing changed. She moved out in July and now rents a room in a house on the Daly City border where she pays $400 more.

Molyneaux says he's become more careful about how he interacts with his tenants. He blames his behavior with Chau in part on changing times.

"The world has changed in 30 years – being able to go up to a woman, 'hello beautiful,' 'hello sexy' ... nowadays that's considered sexual harassment," he said.

It's illegal for landlords to discriminate against tenants based on sex – which includes subjecting them to sexual harassment – under the federal Fair Housing Act and the state Fair Employment and Housing Act. Victims can complain to Bay Area nonprofits such as Project Sentinel, which investigates housing discrimination claims, report the behavior to HUD or the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing or file a lawsuit for monetary damages. But lawyers say tenants often don't know their legal options.

When 49-year-old Tiffani Tanaka started having problems with the plumbing in her rent-controlled, San Francisco studio in 2016, her landlords sent their son-in-law, Bony Sosa, who lived next door. Soon Sosa was making excuses to come into Tanaka's apartment on a regular basis, Tanaka said in a February lawsuit she filed against him and her landlords in San Francisco Superior Court. The suit includes claims of sexual harassment, trespassing, negligence and violating San Francisco's Rent Ordinance. He regularly called her "Miss Beautiful," professed his love for her in a hand-written letter, sent her as many as 25 text messages a week and once walked in on her changing after he entered her apartment unannounced, she said.

"It got really, really uncomfortable," Tanaka said.

Sosa did not respond to calls seeking comment. A lawyer has not yet entered an appearance in the case on his behalf.

Tanaka moved out in October after she says maintenance issues in the apartment came to a head – including a sewage leak that filled her apartment with an odor so noxious it made her nauseated and dizzy – and her landlords pressured her to leave.

In a similar story, Bertha, a mother of three young boys, says she stopped feeling safe in her Concord apartment after the property manager persistently came onto her, touched her without consent, offered free rent in exchange for sex and threatened to evict her if she refused his advances.

In a lawsuit filed in Contra Costa County Superior Court in December, Bertha accused the property manager of going into her bedroom when she wasn't home, rifling through her underwear drawer and leaving her bras scattered on the floor. The suit includes claims of sexual harassment, negligence, unfair business practices and trespassing.

Bertha, a Mexican immigrant who moved into the one-bedroom apartment in 2013, asked that her last name not be used because she still lives there and can't afford to move out.

The property manager's lawyer did not answer calls or emails seeking comment.

"I was afraid, and I felt like I didn't have any privacy," Bertha said in Spanish. Locking her door didn't make her feel safer.

"He has a key," she said, "and could enter anytime he wanted."