COSTA MESA, Calif. – Congressman Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) is locked in a legal battle over a property he rented for his family from 2010-2012. The landlord, Robert Polyniak, claimed Rohrabacher and his family destroyed the property- including broken toilet seats, horrifically stained walls and carpets, and maggots living under a kitchen stove- and wants the Congressman to pay more than $25,000 in damages. Rohrabacher countered that the grotesque condition of the house made the two-plus years his family lived there a living hell, and he demanded a full refund.
This past August, Devon R. Lucas, a lawyer hired by Rohrabacher to represent him in this matter, filed a lawsuit demanding that Polyniak pay Rohrabacher $20,000 for not returning Rohrabacher’s $6,700 security deposit in a timely manner. Not long after, Lucas returned to court to file a second lawsuit, demanding the Congressman be refunded the entire $3,350-per-month rent he paid Polyniak over the course of the rental.
“You should have seen the state of the place when my client finally moved out,” said Lucas. “The level of filth was reprehensible. There was even a dead hooker in the master bathtub. Do you have any idea how hard it was for Congressman Rohrabacher to bathe day after day in a tub containing a dead hooker?”
In addition to the damage mentioned above, Polyniak alleged that Rohrabacher’s habitation resulted in: rusted, grime-encased appliances; cracked light switches; missing bathroom towel bars; dead outdoor vegetation; massive black stains on the carpet; a huge, lubricant-like stain on the floor of Mrs. Rohrabacher’s bedroom; severed phone lines; serious water damage throughout; and an unidentified substance on the walls which may have been feces.
According to Lucas, Congressman Rohrabacher agrees that the home was in a startlingly-abominable condition when his family moved out. “Polyniak had a responsibility to provide my client with a rental property capable of handling the lifestyle of a Republican Congressman,” he said. “Had he done so, the vast majority of those stains would have been sprayed right off the walls of plastic sheeting, leaving minimal permanent damage.”
Rohrabacher admitted that he and his family may have given the house a workout, but felt the amount of damage was par for the course. “There was nothing in that house that was not normal wear and tear,” he said. “If I wasn’t a member of Congress, no one would pay attention to this at all. Even with the dead hooker.”