nuisance tenant-massachusetts

[propman]

what can you do about a nuisance tenant who listens to your communications with a state of the art listening device and submits false correspondence to an attorney who in turn accuses me of inappropriate personal communications. i do not consider rental increases, parking violations and notices pertaining to the property personal communication. yet, this attorney repeatedly sends letters stating the same. i have apparently sent numerous letters to the tenant about this that and everything. the ridiculous point of this is that i have sent correspondence, three to be exact, in response to violations of rules as set forth in this community. now, i have limited my conversations on the telephone to general information, drive to another location to conduct business and whisper to my husband when we need to discuss certain details of the business. could someone please advise me of a quick solution to this interference. the police have stated that this is not something that they handle; i believe they just simply do not know. i am looking for the best and fastest eviction in the history of massachusetts.

 

[LL]

You should hire a lawyer to do the eviction, since you evidently don't know your way around this field. If he is sophisticated enough to know about "state of the art" listening devices (if they really are state of the art), he is sophisticated enough to hire a GOOD eviction lawyer to fight off your eviction. Find a lawyer who does NOTHING but evictions and knows your local court.

Check Mass eavesdropping laws. I know a little about this field, and I am curious what he is using. Is it just a microphone with an amplifier and maybe a dish antenna (sometimes called "fox-ears")? Or, is he tapping into your telephone line? Does he work for NSA? Is he at some place like MITRE?

Federal telecommunications law says one party to the call must know about recording, presumeably eavesdrop also.
California law, just for example, says recording is permissible if only one party knows about it, and if nothing confidential is being discussed.

What are "inappropriate personal communications" ?

 

[propman]

Hey, LL. thanks for your response, but i have a few questions. what is MITRE. this person does not work, collects va benefits and social security (a real people person!). I have seen the dish. it is approximately 8 inches in diameter, clear acryllic with a small tennis ball-like center. we live about 100 feet+ with no obstructions between his livingroom window and our kitchen window where the majoriity of our activity occurs. if you could provide more information about this type of device, i would be deeply indebted. massachusetts has limited eavesdropping laws, as well as most laws on the books. i was told i need a professional to identify the device even though i saw it myself, as well as another neighbor. what's next?

 

[LL]

Sounds like a "fox-ears" antenna. The dish is a sound-wave collector in the shape of a parabola. The parabola has the property that any wave collected by the dish will be reflected in a direction which is normal to the surface of the dish, and that means that they will all converge (focus) on a spot a little bit forward of the center of the parabola. The little ball is called the "horn" and it is right at the focus point and is basically a unidirectional microphone, which is connected to an amplifier and a set of headphones. You can buy it at spy stores and specialty electronics shops. You may also see them on the sidelines at football games, following the coaches around. They're trying to listen to the opposing coach or the opposing huddle. They usually use bigger dishes (collects more sound waves).

The only thing that I can think of to protect yourself is to put a thick as possible barrier between your speech and the antenna, like a brick wall. Dont stand in front of the window when you talk, and face the other way. The brick wall should be enough to block his hearing your speech.

MITRE stands for MIT Research & Engineering. They operate an FFRDC (Federally Funded Research & Development Center) for the Air Force and may do work in this area. But evidently this guy is an amateur who just thought it was cute to buy this as a toy.

Get an eviction lawyer and get rid of him as quickly as you can, if you can.