Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Salemtown Neighbors Hear More on Crime at Shiloh Apartments and Get Locked Down

At last night's Salemtown Neighbors meeting, Metro Police reported that 3 weeks ago their Flex Unit made 5 felony arrests (25 total counts) at the Shiloh Apartments at the corner of 4th Av. and Hume St. During a "Knock and Talk" a tenant gave permission to the police to search her apartment and 3 guns, along with significant amounts of pot, crack, and cocaine were seized by police. The tenant was not among the 5 individuals arrested because police reported that she did not have knowledge of her guests' activities.

The Shiloh Apartments continue to be one of the more suspicious properties in Salemtown. Cars stream in and out of Shiloh at all times of the day and night. That property is rundown and it has been the center of crime in the past. It faces Morgan Park, where a lot of neighborhood children play, which only makes it a bigger hazard and libility to the community. According to Metro Records, the apartments are owned by Amos L. Howard, LLC, of 1214 Bayard Av. in Murfreesboro, TN.

While the police say that they are keeping an eye Shiloh, the primary challenge for our neighborhood watch is that the shape of the complex opens up to the park but closes off from the rest of Salemtown. The best line of sight on Shiloh is Morgan Park Place, which sits across the baseball diamond from Shiloh. So, essentially we have to rely on our Germantown compadres at MPP to watch out for Shiloh's shady activities; and they probably need binoculars to do so.

In an unrelated incident, during last night's police report, both attending officers left the association meeting to respond to an armed robbery in the Morgan Park area. Multiple units and police dogs were called out. Morgan Park Community Center, where we were meeting was locked down for a while, so that we could not leave the building for a while after the Salemtown Neighbors meeting ended. When we did leave, we found the neighborhood thick with cops.

5 comments:

  1. The MNPD needs to have these tenants reported to MDHA for immediate eviction. For the police to think we are buying the story she had no idea about the guns and drugs is insane. Supreme Court Law states that any tenant or friends, relatives etc that are involved with crimes such as this need to be evicted. It's a one strike and one strike law only. Until the MNPD and MDHA are held accountable this crime will continue.

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  2. MDHA is not the owner. Amos L. Howard of Murfreesboro is.

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  3. I understand Mr. Howard is the owner but my guess is he leases the units through section 8. No?

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  4. That I don't know. Where would such info be available?

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  5. Finding out is a great question. What we did was request a list of MDHA properties for our Neighborhood but noticed it was not complete. It did not include such rentals that MDHA has with many investors who use the section 8 voucher. It was enough to get us rolling though.

    We then tried to cross reference it with police reports of addresses with felony arrest. Got some information but there list also was not complete.

    Sometime the property manager, if they will tell you or someone walking around the complex. Just ask if they are section 8 rentals.
    MDHA could also tell you if they wanted to but that is like pulling teeth. Ask for Norman Deik, I believe his name is. Pat Clark is on the defense because we have put pressure on her about the crime with section 8/MDHA rentals.

    We also found out from neighbors surrounding the apartment or houses in the area.

    Let me know how it goes and good luck.

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