The Attorney General charged that almost immediately after buying the building, “Melamed embarked on a campaign to rid it of rent stabilized tenants by cutting essential services such as heat, performing illegal construction and failing to contain and clean toxic lead dust.”

The guilty verdict in the Melamed case comes less than a month after Manhattan landlord Steve Croman pled guilty to felony grand larceny and tax fraud charges in a tenant harassment case brought by the Attorney General. Under a plea agreement, Croman will serve a year in jail.

New York

NEW YORK CITY—Crown Heights landlord Daniel Melamed has been found guilty on three counts of unlawful eviction and faces up to a year in prison.

The guilty plea, announced by the New York State Attorney General's office on Tuesday, was the result of the first arrest stemming from an investigation launched by the AG's Tenant Harassment Prevention Task Force, a collaboration between state and city agencies formed in February 2015. Melamed was arrested in June 2015. He is scheduled to be sentenced on Sept. 13^th and could face up to one year in jail.

“We won't hesitate to bring the full force of the law against anyone who harasses, intimidates, and jeopardizes the health and safety of tenants,” says Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. “Daniel Melamed intentionally endangered rent-stabilized tenants in order to push them out—and line his own pockets. Today's guilty verdict marks another win for our Tenant Harassment Task Force and the strong partnership we've created between the state and the city to hold bad landlords accountable.”

The Attorney General's office presented evidence at trial that showed Melamed, the landlord at 1578 Union St. in Brooklyn, illegally shut off heat to rent regulated tenants, even when temperatures dropped below freezing; repeatedly exposed tenants to lead dust that exceeded acceptable levels by as much as 88 times the permissible threshold; and removed the boiler in the middle of winter from the building without permission from any city or state agency.

The Attorney General charged that almost immediately after buying the building, “Melamed embarked on a campaign to rid it of rent stabilized tenants by cutting essential services such as heat, performing illegal construction and failing to contain and clean toxic lead dust.”

The guilty verdict in the Melamed case comes less than a month after Manhattan landlord Steve Croman pled guilty to felony grand larceny and tax fraud charges in a tenant harassment case brought by the Attorney General. Under a plea agreement, Croman will serve a year in jail.