Jazlynn Major was dug in, refusing to vacate her Central City apartment and hurling insults at her landlord in a series of scornful text messages.

Property manager Vivian Amiewalan had told Major, a 25-year-old Loyola University law student, that she wanted her gone by the end of July. Major responded by calling Amiewalan a “slumlord” and worse. She refused to pay, citing a two-week period without hot water.

Amiewalan didn’t dispute the plumbing problems but still wanted Major out. By July 30, the gloves were off. Amiewalan hadn’t replaced the refrigerator she’d pulled from Major’s apartment and made clear she would pursue eviction.

“I must warn you that this will be unpleasant,” Major fired back. “I’m staying my ass through August like I said. Don’t be an idiot, before you lose everything.”

It took another month for the eviction hearing, which Amiewalan won Monday. The victory was short-lived. A few hours later, Major torched the building, authorities say, leaving it gutted, displacing two dozen former neighbors and killing a dog in the process.



A trove of public documents lay out what is perhaps the most extreme local example to date of the rising tensions between broke tenants and their stressed-out landlords amid the national coronavirus emergency that has left both sides pining for relief.

The newest federal eviction moratorium, more sweeping than the last, gave the vast bulk of renters what they’d hoped for — a win landlord groups say came at their expense. The latest directive from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention led New Orleans court officials to shut down evictions for failure to pay rent in the city Thursday through the end of the year, and left small courthouses across the state measuring their own responses.

The moratorium, aimed at slowing the virus’s spread, covers people making less than $99,000 and might have left Major free of eviction fears had it arrived days earlier.

Major’s attorney on Thursday disputed law enforcement’s decision to arrest her client on 26 counts of arson, arguing that the evidence is circumstantial at best.



The lawyer, Elizabeth Carpenter, said Major if given time would have gotten the money she owed after falling behind due to strains over her studies and the pandemic.

“This whole mess could have easily been avoided,” Carpenter said.

Carpenter said her client, a University of Missouri graduate, came to New Orleans after receiving a scholarship to pursue a law degree. She paid several months’ rent in advance when she first moved into the 25-unit building in the 1600 block of Washington Avenue.

Major was behind $1,700 — two months’ rent — when Amiewalan moved to evict her at 1st City Court on Monday morning. Major had also sent text messages to Amiewalan telling her that she would “slap the dog s—t out of you when I see you again believe that,” saying the landlord had “picked the wrong one.”

Judge Marissa Hutabarat, in her first day on the bench, ordered Major to leave her apartment by 11:30 a.m. Tuesday.

On Monday afternoon, Major “threatened to kill” Amiewalan and her daughter, the landlord said in an application for a since-granted temporary restraining order.

That night, Amiewalan and her husband told investigators that they saw Major’s second-floor apartment was on fire as Major emerged. As the blaze spread, the couple began warning the building’s residents to get out.

Flames and smoke engulfed much of the building. Nearly 70 firefighters eventually halted the blaze’s spread, and the complex’s 26 residents got out safely. But a dog died, and residents were left homeless.

An arrest warrant for Major cites the threats and her purported proximity to the fire when it started. Police near her home in Huntsville, Texas, arrested her Tuesday.

Carpenter on Thursday said nothing in Major’s past suggests she is capable of what she’s accused of doing. Carpenter added that she was investigating claims from Major that at least one of the building managers got “physically aggressive” with her at one point.

A nationwide public records search yielded no criminal history for Major. While documents show a landlord in Missouri tried twice to evict her over unpaid rent, neither case resulted in her eviction, suggesting the dispute was resolved.

“She comes from a good family — she’s very smart,” Carpenter said. “Students can fall behind on rent.”

Yet Amiewalan, 42, says that is not the Major she got to know.

Police tape extended across the sidewalk along Washington Avenue on Thursday afternoon outside the charred carcass of the brick and wrought-iron building that Amiewalan said was built in 1954 and owned by her parents for the last 26 years.

She sat in a chair outside her own apartment, in a courtyard by a pool filled with dark water, staring ahead at the burned-out building.

“I would never evict someone because they don’t have enough to pay,” Amiewalan said. She said Major’s aggression, including a threat on Amiewalan’s child, as opposed to being late on rent, fueled the decision to boot her.

Amiewalen claimed she wanted to help Major, a fellow Black woman.

“Names are nothing,” she said of Major’s text-message invective.

“I’m sad for my friend’s dog who died. I’m sad for all the people who are displaced. If she wanted to kill me, she should have just killed me, not destroyed all these people’s stuff, for nothing,” Amiewalan said.

“She’s not the only person that’s gotten angry at me. She’s just the only person that’s burned my building down.”

LINK: https://www.nola.com/news/crim...9e-7bdb9175b037.html

A law student you say...

quote:

Originally posted by mjlennon:
A law student you say...

She'll make one hell of a lawyer one day. I'd be terrified of winning a case against her client.

Is that law school any good or did they admit her for EO/AA purposes?

Ranked 126 in terms of best law schools.

"Major’s attorney on Thursday disputed law enforcement’s decision to arrest her client on 26 counts of arson, arguing that the evidence is circumstantial at best."

FWIW: Sometimes circumstantial evidence is far better than "eyewitness testimony", admissions of guilt, and scientific evidence. The attorney certainly knows this, but is depending upon the general public's ignorance of the law and just what "Circumstantial" evidence is.

I’m surprised the article didn’t make my computer fall off the table. Poor, poor Majors. Rent should be free during this “trying” time. She is really the victim here. I mean, the person who owns this building doesn’t still have bills of their own to pay. They obviously are rich and the problem is they aren’t paying “their fair share”. This was a mostly peaceful eviction after all.

(Let’s see whose sarcasm meter is in calibrated.)

Hahaha

BTW What is happening in Derby City today??

I’m so glad we rid ourselves of our rental property. Especially with this current mess.

The last straw was renting it to a deputy, who moved out and let his 20something year old son sublease it.

Who then put holes in the walls and let his dog shit everywhere and failed to notify us of a water leak.

And then was arrested for domestic assault. And then trafficking opioids.

Needless to say, paying rent wasn’t a high priority. What a mess that was. $25,000 to make it ready to sell. Never again.

quote:

Originally posted by ammodotcom:

quote:

Originally posted by mjlennon:
A law student you say...

She'll make one hell of a lawyer one day. I'd be terrified of winning a case against her client.

Probably not.

She can pay her way into a law school, but each state bar still has a character and fitness requirement.

Arson is usually a felony, and a dog died, so there's potential for an animal abuse charge too. In Oregon, the arson would be a class A felony and killing the dog would be a class C felony. A conviction for either would disqualify her from practicing law here.

Being a Landlord ain't what it used to be, tenants have more rights than owners, even before the moratorium. We have a 2 family apartment behind us that has made us want to get out of it. The other 2 houses we rent have gone quite well, most of the time. Luckily none of our tenants are using the moratorium to screw with us.

I can't quite grasp how someone studying to be an attorney could make such a choice. Her actions will almost certainly disqualify her from practicing law. Maybe we should hope so, imagine having a lawyer with those morals. (Having said that, I understand it is not uncommon to question the ethics of lawyers).

There are many aspects of legal practice that people either "know" before going to law school or quickly decide they've discovered once classes begin. Delay, imposing expenses and hassle can all dissuade a landlord from evicting a tenant. Said delay, etc., can be generated by simply adopting an obdurate attitude. Said obdurate attitude, if substituted for thinking and strategy (as easily happens, BTW) can lead to some awfully self-defeating decisions.

My question is simple: if she wanted to stay through August, why not just lie low, passively resist, generate as many delays as possible, and leave before September 1st? Being two months behind on rent in New Orleans does NOT mean a tenant no longer has a viable enough position to delay eviction for a month or two as long as the tenant isn't stupid enough to inflict enough additional costs on the landlord to make a concerted effort to evict the tenant cost-effective.

quote:

Originally posted by Scoutmaster:
I can't quite grasp how someone studying to be an attorney could make such a choice. Her actions will almost certainly disqualify her from practicing law. Maybe we should hope so, imagine having a lawyer with those morals. (Having said that, I understand it is not uncommon to question the ethics of lawyers).

When one learns she is entitled and privileged, she also learns consequences are for other people. Of course this is fantasy and if found to be involved, she will suffer the equalizing effect of inevitable reality.

She needs to finish out law school

She needs to get a few more loans before she is done

She needs to graduate near the bottom of her class

And once she’s done all that And racked up the debt, she then needs to spend money on the non-refundable fee to get admitted to the bar and then be rejected.

UPDATE on the story: pictures of law student and the fire at the link.

The Loyola University law student accused of torching a Central City apartment building after her landlord evicted her has been transferred from a lockup in Texas to New Orleans' jail. At a brief hearing Sunday, Orleans Parish Magistrate Commissioner Robert Blackburn set bond for Jaz'Lynn Major at $156,000.

That equates to $6,000 for each of the 26 counts of aggravated arson that Major faces — one for every neighbor who has been displaced by the three-alarm blaze she's accused of igniting on Monday.

According to public records, Major owed $1,700, or two months’ rent, as of Monday, the day her landlord obtained an eviction order.

The landlord alleged that Major, a second-year law student, threatened to kill her later that day. That evening, Major’s landlord and the landlord’s husband reported that they saw Major leaving the apartment building in the 1600 block of Washington Avenue as a fire raged inside.

The landlord and her husband warned the residents of their 25-unit building to flee as the blaze spread. Nearly 70 firefighters eventually extinguished the blaze, and no person was injured. But a dog was killed, and residents were left homeless, officials said.



In later obtaining an arrest warrant for Major, who lived in Apt. 19, a state arson investigator cited her alleged proximity to the start of the fire. The warrant also referred to a series of threatening and abusive text messages that Major purportedly sent to her landlord over the previous several weeks.

One of those messages called the landlord “a slumlord,” while another read, “Don’t be an idiot, before you lose everything.”

Major was in her hometown of Huntsville, Texas, when police there arrested her on the arson warrant the day after the fire, according to authorities. She was there several days as officials in New Orleans arranged a transfer.

Evicted Loyola law student allegedly threatened landlord before New Orleans apartment fire
Evicted Loyola law student allegedly threatened landlord before setting New Orleans apartment fire: 'This will be unpleasant'
Major’s landlord, Vivian Amiewalan, said Friday that late rent wasn’t the only reason she moved for an eviction. Amiewalan said Major’s aggressive words — as well as an alleged threat on Amiewalan’s child — had fueled the decision to boot her.

Major's new attorney, Rachel Conner, said on Sunday that she was disappointed in the bond that Blackburn set, saying there is no risk that Major won't return to court.

"Jaz'Lynn has never been in trouble with the law, has a very bright future as a law student at Loyola law school, has a tremendous amount of support from the community there and has every intention of answering these charges," Conner said.

"The bond system — like the housing court — should not be exploiting vulnerable people, particularly during this difficult time."

Each aggravated arson count carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.

In an appeal on GoFundMe for donations to a legal defense, a younger sister described Jaz'Lynn Major as "a pillar in our family" who has supported family members while their mother has dealt with health problems.

"This past year ... she constantly drove from New Orleans to Huntsville, mostly at night after her classes, so she could be present and help with caring for our nephews and niece," LyShanette Major wrote. "She has always shown up for all of us and now we must show up for her."

A federal eviction moratorium, coincidentally announced the day after the fire, led New Orleans court officials to shut down evictions in the city for failure to pay rent through the end of the year.


LINK: https://www.nola.com/news/crim...69-e7a6e8ec2b79.html

I guess the only law she'll be practicing, will be her defense behind bars!!!!!

Oh, she may wind up trading legal advice for, say, not getting beat up or having to have sex with the meanest woman on her tier. The problem is that if she gives them bad advice, she's living among some of the toughest clients a lawyer will ever have.

IOW, it's particularly lousy place to be a baby lawyer.

Think of all the first hand experience she is about to get with our legal system.

quote:

a University of Missouri graduate

That says a lot....