I Was Wrongfully Evicted. How Can I Get Help?

On June 26,2024 I was evicted from an apartment that I stayed in for 6 almost 7 years. It was a low income apartment. In 2021, my issues began when the property manager at the time failed to give me an Interim Recertification after my household income changed in October of 2021. It decreased For months I begged her to do an Interim Recertification because it was becoming too hard to continue paying the amount that went by a higher household income. In December of that year I began emailing the office to keep a record of all the times that I would reach out. On January 14, 2022 the property manager placed the IR Certification paperwork on my door and my kids and I filled it out. Months went by and still no change had happened to my rent. In the meantime, in March, I reached out to the ERAP program because my rent was now getting behind. I was told by the property manager that once she completed my IR Cert that I’d have a major credit on my rent. Fast forward to May of 2022 and I notice that my rent is saying $0. That was because on May 9,2022 the property manager had applied the ERAP money to my account. So, no credit! I emailed and called and she said that we needed to come over and do the IR again. We did and still NO CHANGE! Come to find out, she was sending off the information to places like unemployment and social services to have our income verified, but she wasn’t completing the interim process. I have no idea why, but in June of 2022, I reported her to her supervisor at that time and instead of her helping me, she helped cover up what she had done and in August of 2022 I reported the company as a whole to the local HUD. They lady from HUD assured me that she’d help me and that my kids and I just needed to go do a new lease. That didn’t sit right with me so once I did the lease and the lease was completed I didn’t sign it. Good thing I didn’t, because the lease was not correct. She tried to gaslight me into believing that the property manager had done nothing wrong. The HUD worker not knowing that I never signed the new lease told me that due to me not having subsidy she couldn’t help me. Not having subsidy was new to me, but come to find out in August of 2021 when I had done an Interim Recertification to let the company know that I was no longer receiving unemployment, they upped my household income instead of lowering it and took my subsidy. I know the question is going to be how did they take it without me knowing and the answer is they didn’t follow procedure and tell me and even though they upped my household income for some reason the rent did decrease like it should have and I knew nothing besides that everything looked right. For nearly a year after the August 2022 lease was done nothing changed. The company was refusing to correct the errors and give me credit on my rent and I was refusing to sign any paperwork until things were corrected. Fast forward to July 2023, the company took me to court for Failure To Pay Rent. I wrote the judge and gave him all of my evidence and the court appointed me an attorney. She and I sat down with the management company and it was proven that i didn’t owe them any of the $10,748 that they claimed I owed. The case was dismissed without prejudice in court in October 2023. The agreement was that after that day the company would get all of my stuff organized so that I could be back on track and paying the correct rent with a good amount of credit on my account due to ERAP having paid about $6,662 in rent that I hadn’t even owed for me. Well, the company never did fix things and after the hearing the lawyer I had never followed up and made sure that they did what was supposed to be done. On March 14,2024 I sent a 4 page letter to the local HUD again and I was told that the company was in non compliance due to me staying there almost 3 years with no subsidy. They also said that the company was supposed to have provided me with a non subsidized unit or helped me move to a non subsidized property. Well, the crazy thing is, my subsidy should have never been taken in the first place. I was told that they’d help, but nope! They stopped talking to me and then the next day the property manager(newly hired) filed another FTPR on me. I reached out to the free legal place that the Sheriff had given me when he gave me the court papers and I thought that I’d have legal representation on my court date that was scheduled for May 29, 2024. Unfortunately, I was wrong. Due to miscommunication between the secretary of the legal company, the lawyer and myself, the lawyer and I missed one another entirely on the day of court. That resulted in me having to go in front of a judge that was standing in for the usual judge and I asked for a postponement and he said no. I tried to tell him facts about the case and he didn’t want to hear it. In the end I was so scared and so nervous that I almost passed out. I got dizzy and asked to sit down. He did nod his head and said that I could be seated. So, after I was seated he asked the company how much would they accept for me to pay over time and stay and they said $10,000. He asked me if I agreed and I said I could do $5,000. Mind y’all I didn’t even owe them that!! I was just so scared that he’d give me 3 days to move out. So, when he said did I agreed to pay $10,000 again I said sure. I didn’t say Yes. I said sure and as soon as court was over I went to s self help legal advice place and they helped me file motions to do all kinds of things to stop what was happening. None worked! Every judge said that I consented. I was then given 7 days by the management company to pay $10,000. When I couldn’t they went and filed a Warrant of Restitution and I left the day of the eviction prior to the Sheriff coming. I was literally wrongfully evicted. They never fixed any issues, never gave me any credits they just put me out. To add insult to injury, the Warranty of Restitution was for the amount of $10,060 including court fees and on the final move out papers they stated that I owed $16,115.76 in rent and that I only accrued $55 in interest on my security deposit. They said that the security deposit began accruing interest in 2023, but I lived there since March 1,2018. There is so much more to my story. I need help extremely bad! There was always new property managers being hired or we didn’t have one for months. They also evicted me using the lease the supervisor did in 2022 when the newest property manager had put a paper on my door that was dated January 4,2024 stating that my new lease for September 2023 has just been completed. I had never been given a copy of that lease(9/23) and it was destroyed. Please if someone knows of any hat I can do to get justice I need any and all help I can get. This company has done this many times to people. I am just the only one that has proof of my claims going back so far.