A tenant of a Liberty City apartment building who has complained about the building's conditions remained without power Tuesday, as officials said they're writing up the landlord for violating city code.
"I don't know what else to do," Jameena Grimes said Tuesday. ""I'm tired, I'm hot, I'm hungry, I don't know what else to do."
Grimes is tired of fighting. She has been unplugged and living in the dark since Saturday, when the power in her unit at the Liberty City Apartments at 1231 Northwest 61st Street suddenly went out.
Grimes says she lost power shortly after speaking out about the deplorable conditions in her building, including mold, holes in the walls and other unsanitary conditions and structural deficiencies.
Florida Power and Light crews have been at the building on Sunday and Monday, and officials said they discovered someone tampered with an electrical meter inside.
But three days later, Grimes' power wasn't on, none of her appliances were working and all of her food had to be thrown out.
It turns out it's no easy fix. FPL discovered the meter had been torn out of the wall. Grimes believes it was in retaliation for bringing the building's problems to light.
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"When I started complaining about my other living conditions, they took my box, they took the wires, took the meter, took everything," Grimes said.
The city's chief electrical inspector was at the scene Tuesday, and said he's writing the landlord up for violating city code.
Grimes wasn't paying FPL for power, she was paying the apartment complex. In fact, FPL has no official record of her living at the building.
FPL officials said of the 20 families living in the building, only six have legitimate accounts.
For the power to be restored, the property manager would have to pay to fix the electrical box so tenants like Grimes could set up real accounts. NBC 6 has repeatedly tried to contact property manager Kat Williams to no avail. Efforts to contact the landlord, Denise Vaknin and Miami Beverly LLC, have also been unsuccessful.
Grimes was asked why she doesn't just leave the building.
"I wish, if I had resources to do so I would've been gone, it wouldn't have gotten this far," she said.
