I would suggest not lying (anonymous complaint “oh, I was just walking my dog…” style). Evaluate how you feel about it. If it was a big deal, don’t pass it off as “well, it was strange and I thought I should let you know about it…” If you felt threatened, say that. If you feel like it wasn’t a big deal (and I don’t think you do feel that way) then leave it alone. But you have to pick one.
Management should never reveal the source of a complaint, especially when the complaint is about aggressive behavior. A lot of times it’s pretty obvious where the complaint came from (because, really, most people know when they’re being douchebags) so lying about being an uninterested party, i.e. suggesting the complaint is from somebody who doesn’t even live in the building, isn’t going to save you anyway. However, there’s a very good chance Anonymous Passerby’s single complaint will not be taken seriously. If it were me, I would think that was very much Not My Problem and do absolutely nothing about it at all.
Don’t call the manager. Well, call if you want to, but don’t JUST call; provide your detailed complaint in writing. If you don’t, you’ll probably be asked to anyway.
Finally, if you feel like your complaint isn’t being addressed to your liking/fast enough for you, please don’t immediately start bitching at the manager. No matter how much we really want to help you, sometimes we have our own impossible hoops to jump through.
P.S. The cops don’t give a shit. Maybe if you’d called to report the suspicious behavior at the time, but there’s nothing they can really do about it now.
Yeah, there are only a few apartments here. I have seen him before. I may have nodded at him to say hello before. He has generally been pretty quiet and lives upstairs with his son. Both he and his son always wear army shirts (it may just be his son now that I think of it, but he was wearing the same shirt that night).
The police once showed up to his apartment before and were trying to call to him or his son at night and trying to get him to open the door. They were being loud about it too. I think they said something about threatening to tell the apartment manager about something, although I can’t quite remember what that was about now.
Also, technically I don’t know if it was him or his son, but if I remember right: there was someone who had a mohawk who was up near that house at night. It may have been the son who later shaved his head. But I was sitting on a bench outside of my apartment door and the guy saw me looking at him at night. It wasn’t like a stare, I was just glancing his way: I don’t see people with mohawks every day. He looked over at me, stretched his arms out wide and nodded his head. This was body language for, “what? You want to start something, guy who is looking at me?” I looked away. (This may have been the apartment next to his, it was a long time ago to not remember if that guy was living at the apartment right next to his, but there is a strong likelyhood that it was the same people. Could also be someone they knew though.)
In any case, I am somewhat uncomfortable going and talking to him about it. I think he may feel I am trying to get on his case (“what happened where you were acting WEIRD the other night?” If he is oftentimes violent, then this isn’t the message I want to subcommunicate)
It could be the case. However, if that is an iscolated incident then management would probably do nothing. If I say something to them and they’re like, “oh, THAT guy, I’ve heard about him before…” then it is probably best to be reported.
Yeah, it was a big thing as it was happening. And he doesn’t ‘normally flip out’ to where he wouldn’t know which guy complained about him, he would know it was me. Not good considering that he knows which apartment I live in, seems to have military training, and that I live with my parents and younger brother. Thanks for the advice. I feel mostly comfortable just talking about it to the manager, I don’t know how the cops would handle it, plus I don’t know enough about what was going on to potentially get him into jail (at least to where I am comfortable doing that). I think I will just talk to the manager.
I walked in to the apartment managers room in a different complex. I talked to his son who I know. He says that the guy is an ex gang member as well as mentally unstable. He has assaulted someone here before and went to jail over it. Once the cops had to kick his door in to come and arrest him (might be the same occasion) and that is now why his door is painted a different color then everyone elses (because he had to repaint). Several days after the thing with me, he started shouting at someone randomly bicycling by our place.
The son told the father the details. At least the important ones as I talked to him at a later date and he said that he understood that the guy was aggressive. He at this point doesn’t want to do anything. He said that the guy was put on a 51-50 (although I am not sure he understood fully what that means, I am pretty sure that the guy got a forced mental health hospitalization. I haven’t seen him around lately so it fits).
As of right now, the apartment manager says just to lay low, and if anything else happens like that then to tell him. Also he says to threaten the guy if he is like that again saying you will tell the apartment manager, but thinking back on it now the guy would have likely become way more violent if I said that.
In any case, apart from the (seeming) mental health hospitalization, I don’t think anything is going to happen to the guy, at least now.
I, however, don’t know if I should leave it alone. I am big on 2nd and 3rd chances, or however many. But I don’t like gambling with my family living here and a potential violent encounter, of me or of someone else, maybe even one of the children who live in this complex. I am thinking I may go to the police.
You should definitely have gone home, picked out a handgun, and made a mess of him in the hallway. "MERKA!
But seriously, the older I get the less tolerant I am of assholes, even drunk ones. Life’s too short to put up with people like that. Rat him out mercilessly and be done with it. It’s really the only proactive thing you can do to ensure your own security. You’ll feel like an idiot if you try to be cool about it and he eventually decides to make a mess of you in the hallway.
One hostile act is definitely one hostile act. The question is whether it’s a problem that needs being taken care of, not whether it’s hostile.
My general rule is anything that just happens once with no consequences isn’t a problem – but that’s with normal neighbor issues like noise or nuisances. In a case like this where it’s a clue that there might be danger, it’s best to at least check it out, as Gateway did.
I think where that’s coming from is reasonable advice to discuss it with the people on the lease before taking any action, out of courtesy, but it’s moot.
