Seriously Could Dickens Have Come Up With A Better Villian Than Bruce Ratner?

He gave us Scrooge, Uriah Heep, Fagon, Bill Sikes, what novel would a modern day Charles Dickens weave with such icons of greed and dishonesty like Bruce Ratner?No Land Grab Reports:

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Atlantic Yards Report

The Daily News got the scoop, but Norman Oder gets some answers on what's going on with Forest City Ratner's eviction of a local day care center.

As the New York Daily News reported yesterday, developer Forest City Ratner, which now owns the [487 Dean Street] building, is evicting tenant Shirley Milligan for failing to pay back rent of $3000 a month. But her lawyer tells me the developer told Milligan not to pay that rent.

Milligan told the Daily News she’d signed the lease in 2004 not knowing the building was to be part of the Atlantic Yards footprint, and put money into renovations for a day care center. Forest City Ratner spokesman Loren Riegelhaupt told the Daily News, "Forest City offered to buy her out of her lease and to reimburse her for money she spent to fix up the space, along with forgiving back rent owed… For reasons unknown to us, she decided instead to continue to withhold rent.”

Milligan’s attorney, Michael Rikon, disputes that statement. “She was specifically told by Forest City not to pay any rent," he told me, going beyond statements he made to the Daily News. "She was told that the developer would present a better offer to settle her potential condemnation claim and until that was done she should not pay rent."

"No new offer was forthcoming and the next thing she knew was a reporter from the News who lived on Dean Street calling to tell her she was being evicted. She was never served and went down to the premises for a copy of the pleadings. She is upset that there is an impression that she is a deadbeat.”

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In another lawsuit - a bilked nets investor, claimed that when he asked Ratner to make good on his word, Ratner could not recall and said "as you know I have a memory problem" (no you don't Bruce, you have an ethics problem) .

Considering that, the outright attempted lease swindle co-ordinated with Shaya Bolygreen, who are we to believe here? As reported elsewhere Bruce Ratner was perfectly willing to kick out Brookyn Tech students to build luxury condos, so its safe to assume he's willing to kick out pre-school children. He lied about giving campaign contributions to politicians - which he funnels through family friends like 'crusading civil rights lawyer ' (except where Ratner family interests are concerned) Michael Ratner, he has repeatedly lied or tried to conceal the scale of the project, his profit from it, the amount of subsidies...well, you get the picture. He is greed, personified.

As usual, he got the supine press to do his bidding for him, as usual, Norman Oder reports what the Daily News left out.