Ironworks Gaming Forum - Crew gets lost, demolishes wrong house

From: http://www.azcentral.com/news/articl...ghouse-ON.html

Crew gets lost, demolishes wrong house
Michael Kiefer
The Arizona Republic
Jul. 9, 2003 07:55 PM

Jenny Lopez had plans for her old house.

She'd owned it for 30 years, raised her kids in it, and when she bought a house a few blocks away, her son stayed and raised his kids in it, too.

She was going to remodel it, but someone else beat her to it.

On Wednesday, a crew hired to demolish a house across the street, took her house down by mistake. All that remains is a low pile of plywood and tar paper, an empty freezer and scattered children's stuffed animals. The crew even tore down Lopez's prized trees and shrubs, which she still watered every day, even though she wasn't living in the house.

"There's a lot of memories lost," said Lisa Lopez, 29, her daughter, who grew up in the house. Her five nieces and nephews, aged 6 to 12, picked through the litter, looking at their own Pound Puppies toys amid the rubble.

The neighborhood just north of Buckeye Road is full of light industry-there's a caterering business behind Lopez's house and a bus-washing lot across the street behind the intended demolition. But there are small, low-income frame houses on large parched lots up and down South 29th Avenue, some of them occupied by transients, some by long-time owners like Lopez.

The house that was supposed to be demolished was boarded up and fenced in. It belongs to Foresight Investment Group of Phoenix, which had purchased the property on speculation.

"We were either going to sell the property or build a new house," said Joe Uruquart, one of the company's owners.

A neighbor noticed the trucks and backhoe late Wednesday morning, thought something was strange, and called one of Lopez's relatives.

"I was at work, and my daughter called and said they're tearing down your house," Lopez said.

At the same time, Donald Whitney, Lisa Lopez's boyfriend, raced over. There was a backhoe and a couple of one-ton trucks on the lot, ready to haul away the debris, but the little frame house, was already flat.

"What the hell you guys doing?" he screamed. "You're knocking down my house."

Then Jenny Lopez arrived. She's petite, and the workman in charge, identified by 12 News as David Gomez, towered over her.

"What's going on?" Lopez asked Gomez.

And though Gomez was clearly shaken, that question has yet to be answered, even in hindsight.

Foresight's owners couldn't explain the mistake.

"I don't know, I'm trying to find out myself," Uruquart said.

"The people we hired, hired some people," he continued and refused to comment further.

Gomez assured Lopez that his boss would take care of her, she claims.

Shortly after, she says, an unidentified man showed up at the property and offered her $30,000, which she turned down, because she claimed she has already received an offer of $45,000 from the owner of the catering business behind her lot.

The house numbers are not well-marked on the street, and the mailboxes all lie on one side, further muddying which is which. And though the house that was supposed to be destroyed is clearly derelict, Lopez's house, though in much better condition, was clearly empty, as well.

"It was a vacant house," said Javier Denogean, the caterer who was trying to buy the house from Lopez. "You could tell no one was living there."

But Lopez and her son Richard think otherwise.

"It still had curtains," Richard said.

Lopez's truck was still parked in back, and the yard was well kept.

Jenny Lopez mourned her well-kept plants, oleander, bougainvillea and a lemon tree that she had planted and nursed for decades. All were ripped from the ground, and were already withering in the afternoon heat.

"That's what I miss," she said, her voice cracking, "my plants."

David Gomez, the demolition man, told 12 News, "Probably I'm going to lose my job."