Except the cops aren’t going to come by and throw you out, any more than they’re going to throw the squatter out. If you’re in the house and the squatter wants you removed and calls the cops, what are the cops supposed to do?
We have two people, both of whom claim to live in the house. The cops have no way to determine on the spot if either claim is true or false. So they don’t throw you out, they don’t throw the squatter out. Thing is, in most cases of trespassing there’s very clear evidence that the trespasser doesn’t live there, and the cops can order the trespasser to leave and if he doesn’t leave they arrest him. But in the case of a squatter it’s not clear.
So you have two people, who do the cops throw out? Neither, unless there is some other evidence of a crime, like domestic violence. If you start punching the squatter, then you might be arrested for battery.
The cops are not legal experts, and cannot evict someone from a house just on the say-so of some random person. Even if the person is entirely correct, how are the cops supposed to know they are correct? Get a court order and the cops will evict the person. Without a court order they won’t. And the cops aren’t going to evict you if you break into the house and start living there too. The problem with this strategy is that squatters typically have a lot less to lose, and don’t care so much about arrest records and property damage. Even if you win a fistfight with a homeless guy you’re still worse off than before.
Sorry, not buying it. Cops need to be careful but they don’t need to be idiots. If a guy is sitting in an empty house with a pile of someone else’s belongings on the back porch and no ID for that address and a mailbox full of mail to someone else and admits he just claimed the property, the cops can fucking arrest him.
Yes, cops don’t have to be idiots. But if a squatter can plausibly impersonate a renter having a beef with an abusive landlord, then the cops are going to wait for a court order. I certainly don’t advocate wandering into people’s houses and refusing to leave and when the cops show up claiming to live there. Probably going to get you arrested.
The difference between you and a squatter is that the squatter has a lot less to lose. Oh, he gets arrested? Big deal, he’s got three meals and a roof for a couple of weeks. He might get into a violent confrontation with an enraged homeowner? So what? He loses his job? What job? The point is, the antisocial squatter has a whole different cost-benefit analysis than a normal homeowner would, and outcomes that would be a disaster for a normal person are mild inconveniences for him.
We’re arguing the same side of this. My entire post was a response to the suggestion that the police use the address on a drivers license as proof of who lives somewhere. Which is obviously not a workable system, for the reasons we have both pointed out. Which is why, as you point out, they don’t do that.
The thing about renters is they may not have a lease, or valid receipts for their cash payments of rent, but they still sign a rental agreement and get a copy. If the person in the house cannot produce that, or some other document that says they have a right to be there, the police really ought to show them out.
Not necessarily even that. I lived for ten years in a rented guest house on a 50-acre ranch, with absolutely nothing in writing other than the canceled checks for the rent I paid each month. (Back in the day when one got their canceled checks back.) This arrangement even persisted when, after the first six months, the owner sold the property and new owners moved in.
An oral contract is just as binding as a written one (though harder to prove.) Just because there’s no piece of paper doesn’t mean that no lease exists. A person paying rent in cash with a handshake rental agreement can’t easily prove anything to the cops but he’s still entitled to the same protections as any tenant and due process.
Heh. I wonder what would happen in a ‘make my day’ state like Colorado, that I forcibly removed squatters from my house.
If in my home, I am able to use deadly force to remove those that invade it. What if I start from outside the house? On my property. I get home after a week vacation and find people living in my house.
I suspect it would not go well for me. But, if I am on my own property, and find people in my house (of course I would call the cops first). The police are at least 30 minutes away where I live. There is not a duty to retreat in Colorado.
Guess when you go on vacation it’s in your best interest to arrange for a trusted friend or neighbor to come by to collect the mail, water the plants, make sure nobody’s moving in.
Maybe provide them with a limited POA (notarized) to debunk any claims made by squatters and pursue trepassing complaints.
Is there any profile of what types of properties tend to be targeted by squatters?
Doesn’t seem particular hard to go to the county property tax GIS (there is one for every county around here) and find the owner of record.
Hell, I sometimes browse it just to see who owns what and what the property taxes and valuations are. This is public information.
Of course, that doesn’t prove or disprove rental agreements, but if the cops come up and the squatters claim to **own **the property, you can easily disprove that in seconds.
This sort of thing is very rare, even in loony sovcit territory. A vacationer is far more likely to be targeted by an ordinary burglar. Don’t lose sleep over it.
I don’t think he’d get much due process should someone show up with an id that matches the property records and who has been paying the taxes shows up and the renter can’t produce a lease or evidence of regular payments and the owner accuses them of trespass. One is criminal, the other civil.
From above link:
“The investigation revealed that the Skates’ ascribe to a set of beliefs often described as the ‘Sovereign Citizen Movement.’
From Arlo Guthrie:
“And can you imagine fifty people a day? I said FIFTY people a day . . .
Walkin’ in, singin’ a bar of “Alice’s Restaurant” and walkin’ out? Friends,
They may think it’s a MOVEMENT, and that’s what it is: THE ALICE’S
RESTAURANT ANTI-MASSACREE MOVEMENT!”
It’s like killer bees - I thought they’d never get here. But they are.
I guess I shouldn’t be shocked. I always referred to those nearly-off-the-grid residents of Apache Junction as “free thinkers”. I guess they were always just non-aligned sovereign citizens. I just never knew the terminology.