News

Landlord Tries to Evict Whistleblower Tenant

Written by MIKE FITZGERALD

Awoman who lives in the longtroubled Southwest Crossing apartment complex, in south St. Louis, says she and her family have been told to leave by the apartment owner because she spoke to the Riverfront Times for a story.

The RFT story, published in late August, was about the wave of evictions facing St. Louis because of the economic recession caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. In the story, the woman — Janica Washington — said she and her four children would have nowhere to go if they were kicked out.

Washington received a letter on September 18 from the Sansone Group informing her she had com

Terrell Porter holds the eviction letter he received from Sansone Group. | MIKE FITGERALD

mitted an infraction of tenant rules “due to over occupancy for a two bedroom apartment home per publicized Riverfront Times interview.”

Four days later, Washington and her husband Terrell Porter received a letter of termination of vacancy from Sansone informing them they had 30 days to vacate for non-payment of rent.

“The first thing that came to my mind was, ‘They can’t do this,’” Washington says.

She and Porter acknowledge they have not paid rent in recent months. But that’s because they have joined the apartment complex’s few remaining tenants in a rent strike in response to what they say is Sansone’s failures to repair a wide range of health and safety problems since the company took over management last December. These defects include mold growing on many apartment ceilings walls, leaking pipes, crumbling plaster and drywall, flies in refrigerators and the strong odor of feces emanating from the ground floor of the apartment building where Washington and Porter live with their four kids.

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“I don’t know what’s happening down there,” Washington says. “I just know it smells like feces.”

Other tenants interviewed for this story recite a litany of other problems in the apartment complex, including accounts of the many vacant and boarded-up apartments being used as venues for drug dealing, prostitution and the sheltering of homeless people.

Jim Sansone, the designated spokesman for Sansone Group, did not return multiple calls seeking comment.

Washington and Porter plan on talking to the ArchCity Defenders, a local legal aid group, to challenge the order to vacate.

“I know this was not right,” Porter says. “I know you can’t evict us for having an interview with the Riverfront Times. That’s not right at all.”

Washington and Porter still have a few cards left to play. St. Louis city officials extended the city’s eviction moratorium until Nov. 6 — the second month in a row they took that step. In addition, Washington and Porter have not received any court paperwork, signed by a judge, ordering them to leave their apartment, as required by law.

Porter called Sansone Group “heartless” for seeking to evict a family during the middle of a nationwide pandemic.

“This is just wrong,” Porter says. n

Needles Out in Quilting Suppliers’ Rivalry

Written by DANNY WICENTOWSKI

The outline of a stitch and a circular color pattern featured in the logo of a Missouri-based quilt-box subscription service is at the center of a trademark dispute launched in federal court this past week.

Cotton Cuts, a Chesterfield company that also operates a retail location in the Chesterfield Mall, is now asking a federal judge to decide whether its “Rosa” logo, a circular swirl of colorful fabrics, is being infringed by the logo of a competing quilt-box subscription service.

That company, Kentucky-based Paper Pieces, runs a service called Quilty Box. Its logo features a stitched outline and a color arrangement that, as described in an August 18 cease-and-desist letter from Cotton Cuts, represents a “blatant copy” of the Rosa design.

“Clearly, Quilty Box’s continued use of this infringing logo will lead to confusion among consumers,” the letter stated, noting that Cotton Cuts had registered its design in 2016, while Paper Pieces launched its Quilty Box service in 2019.

Among the infringing elements, Cotton Cuts argued that Quilty Box had lifted “external stitching fully encompassing the rainbow elements” and “rainbow patterned elements emanating from a white center.”

Cotton Cuts’ letter demanded that Paper Pieces remove its Quilty Box logo from the web and social media.

But ten days later, Paper Pieces fired off its own cease-and-desist letter, accusing Cotton Cuts of essentially committing the same infringement. The letter from Paper Pieces’ attorney began, “Thank you for making us aware of your infringe

Logos of Cotton Cots (le) and Paper Pieces are at the center of the quilting beef. | SCREENSHOTS

ment of our trademark.”

In its response, Paper Pieces noted that its Quilty Box logo was based on the company’s older logo design, which it had been using since 2002. “Our Quilty Box logo is derived from our branding,” the letter stated. “As you can clearly see, your logo is very close to our registered trademark.”

In its lawsuit filed this week, Cotton Cuts countered once again with its claims that its Rosa design is the one being infringed; the company wants the judge to resolve the “actual controversy” over which logo is violating the trademark of the other.

Messages left last week with the attorneys representing the companies were not immediately returned. n

COVID-19 Surges at Veterans Homes

Written by DOYLE MURPHY

Veterans homes across Missouri are battling an outbreak of COVID-19 cases, state officials say.

There are seven homes and a total 1,238 beds operated by the Missouri Veterans Commission. For months of the pandemic, the state’s homes saw few cases, but that changed in September. As of Friday, there were 122 veterans and 33 staff members with active cases of COVID-19, according to the commission.

That includes veterans at five of the seven homes and staff at six of the homes.

Missouri Governor Mike Parson announced on Friday he was ordering a review of all seven homes and was bumping up the supply of tests, starting with a shipment of 2,400 delivered last week.

“The recent sudden positive case growth among staff and residents in our Veterans Homes, and most importantly, the tragic loss of lives of veterans in our care are, in my opinion, unacceptable,”

bers could only visit on the other side of window glass or through video chats. Only since August has the commission relaxed some of the restrictions, allowing masked visits outdoors.

Parson visited two of the homes last month, entering the Mount Vernon Veterans Home on September 15 to speak to staff.

In the weeks since, cases have spiked. In Mount Vernon, there are now 27 veterans and four staffers with the coronavirus, according to the commission.

Parson and his wife

Gov. Mike Parson tweeted this photo on September 15, Teresa tested positive for showing him inside Mount Vernon Veterans Home. | COVID-19 on September MIKE PARSON/TWITTER 23. The governor’s spokeswoman told the RFT last week there was “no conParson said in a news release. nection” between Parson’s visit

All the homes immediately and the recent surge of cases. began following new protocols “A screening process was done when COVID-19 hit Missouri and before entering, social distance have worked to keep veterans and was practiced, and masks were staff safe throughout the pandemworn,” spokeswoman Kelli Jones ic, according to the commission. said in an email.

“From the first day that COThe governor and his wife had VID-19 was detected in Missouri, mild cases of the virus, and Parson the Veterans Homes implemented said in a video filmed on Sunday an extensive plan based on best at his farm in Bolivar that he and practices to attempt to keep the viTeresa have recovered and were rus out of our homes and protect headed back to Jefferson City, elevour veterans,” the commission’s en days after they tested positive. executive director Paul Kirchhoff “Thanks, everybody. Looking said in a news release. forward to being back at work,”

In early March, the commission said Parson, who is running for announced visitors would not be his first full term after replacing allowed inside the state’s veterEric Greitens, who resigned amid ans homes in hopes of limiting the a sex scandal. “See you on the trail spread of the virus. Family membefore long.”

The commission says it’s not yet clear how many veterans at the homes have died as a result of COVID-19. On Friday, Parson said in a news release that there have been deaths at four of the facilities.

Parson regularly encourages people to wear masks and maintain social distance, but he has also rejected calls for a statewide mask mandate and has at times downplayed the severity of the pandemic. He has also attended multiple large events without a mask, interacting with similarly unmasked attendees. In May, he tweeted out photos of himself, posing maskless with masked members of the Disabled American Veterans in Joplin.

Meanwhile, Missouri’s COVID-19 rates have risen to among the worst in the nation. More than 2,100 people in the state have died as a result of the virus and more than 132,000 have tested positive.

Among the veterans homes, facilities in Cape Girardeau, Mount Vernon and St. James have been hit the hardest. Cape had 57 veterans and twelve staff members with COVID-19 as of Friday, according to the commission. St. James had 24 vets and nine staff members with active cases.

Kirchhoff said the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs is helping to provide more staffing and other resources in the Cape and St. James homes.

Only the home in Mexico, Missouri, was reporting zero cases. The St. Louis Veterans Home has two staff members and no veterans with COVID-19. n

Ex-Kirkwood Teacher Charged with Sodomy

Written by DOYLE MURPHY

Aformer Kirkwood High School drama teacher has been charged with sex crimes dating back to alleged abuse in the late 1990s.

Christopher Stephens, 54, is facing two counts of statutory rape and three counts of statutory sodomy, all felonies.

The charges followed explosive allegations that were posted this summer by former students. Riverfront Times reporter Cheryl Baehr spoke to multiple alumni in July who alleged that Stephens had taken advantage of them when they arrived in his drama classes as shy underclassmen.

Katie Pappageorge told Baehr that she was a twelve-year-old freshman when she first took Stephens’ class after skipping two grades and entering high school early. She said the teacher latched onto her almost immediately, manipulating her into rehearsing sexual theater scenes one on one as he twisted his role as a mentor to draw her into an illicit sexual relationship that lasted into her junior year.

“I was very confused,” Pappageorge says. “I thought I was in love with this man. He’d completely isolated me. This whole time, I thought I was participating in drama, but the only person who knew about it was him.”

Another former student, Kate Hurster Espinosa, says she was abused by Stephens during the same time period. She says she was a young teen in the late ’90s when the teacher first made inappropriate contact with her.

“I can look back on it now and say, ‘Oh, that wasn’t OK,’ but I was fourteen years old and a freshman,” Hurster Espinosa told Baehr this summer. “It was shocking, but no one acted like it was wrong, and I figured this was how things were done because I’d never done a play before. I was the youngest person in the

Ex-Kirkwood teacher Christopher Stephens. | COURTESY OF ST. LOUIS COUNTY POLICE

room and the one with the least amount of power.”

Stephens was forced out of Kirkwood in the late ’90s when word of misconduct surfaced, and the women say the school’s leadership washed their hands of the allegations, offering them no support, counseling or even the acknowledgment that they had been abused. Pappageorge told Baehr it took her years to come to terms with the abuse. Even after she did, contacting police and Stephens’ new employers, it was difficult to get anyone to act, she said.

Her post in July on a Kirkwood High School alumni page inspired others to come forward, revealing allegations of abuse by Stephens and at least one other former teacher.

Charges against Stephens were filed under seal on September 16, but the indictment was unsealed October 1. Stephens’ attorney Bill Margulis told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, which first reported the charges, that his client turned himself in on Monday, posted bond and planned to plead not guilty on Friday.

“My client adamantly denies the allegations and maintains his innocence and looks forward to his day in court,” Margulis told the Post-Dispatch.

After the allegations against Stephens surfaced in July, the Kirkwood School District said it would conduct an investigation and asked anyone with information to come forward. n