Pa.’s top prosecutor sues State College-area landlord after receiving numerous complaints
Pennsylvania’s top prosecutor accused a State College-area landlord in a lawsuit filed Monday of adding illegal administrative fees at the end of a lease and leaving his properties uninhabitable.
Attorney General Josh Shapiro’s 137-page lawsuit alleged Rodney Hendricks retained thousands of dollars from tenants’ security deposits for excessive cleaning and maintenance fees.
The charges were unrelated to any actual damage to the apartment and effectively offloaded “the costs of doing business” to tenants, Deputy Attorney General Benjamin Sirolly wrote in the lawsuit.
Hendricks could not be reached for comment Tuesday.
“Student renters are often first-time renters, they don’t know what to look out for and are more vulnerable to bad actors,” a Shapiro spokesperson wrote in a statement. “The attorney general is committed to doing all he can to protect student renters and ensure landlords can’t take advantage of them.”
Hendricks is the landlord for dozens of properties throughout Centre County, most of which sit less than five miles from Penn State’s flagship campus.
The state’s Bureau of Consumer Protection received myriad complaints about Hendricks over the past decade. Hendricks agreed in 2016 to pay tens of thousands to settle a previous investigation.
That didn’t stop complaints of “deceptive conduct” from pouring in, Sirolly wrote.
One tenant reported being charged to fix damage caused by Hendricks’ maintenance crew, while another said they were charged thousands of dollars to repair ordinary wear and tear.
Another tenant said they were forced to pay an exterminator to rid their apartment of a flea infestation. Others reported a litany of poor living conditions.
Houses being infiltrated by squirrels and a bat, wastewater backing up into a shower, a broken heating system during the winter, collapsing drywall, no electricity and broken appliances were just some of the reported issues.
Other tenants reported Hendricks would enter properties without notice.
The allegations are “part of an ongoing pattern or practice of unfair and deceptive practices that violate ... Pennsylvania law,” Sirolly wrote.