On this rainy Saturday afternoon, a group of protesters turned out once again to pressure serial squatter Sang Kim to leave. This is the second rally to occur in the last few weeks.
“This means a lot to me, and Jaskaran, and my family,” Mrs. Singh told protestors through a megaphone.
Even after owing homeowner Jaskaran Singh tens of thousands of dollars in back rent, Kim is still refusing to leave the property in Bellevue’s Woodridge neighborhood.
“This is going unchecked and seems to be expected as normal by our law and by our leaders,” said one protestor.
So, the attempt at public shaming continues. To add to the absurdity of the situation, Singh’s friends and family members led this weekend’s rally without him.
“How many of you can imagine someone living in your home rent-free for a year to two years?” Thomas asked the crowd.
Singh waited patiently at a park 1,000 feet away from the door of his home, because Kim accused him of harassment and was issued a temporary protection order by a King County judge last week.
While the judge believed Kim’s story, real estate agent Jani Spencer says Kim is a con man and should not be trusted. Spencer says he rented another home in Bellevue several years ago and pulled off a similar stunt. Kim left the homeowners with more than 80,000 dollars in unpaid rent.
“Every other week he had an excuse for why he wasn’t leaving,” Spencer explains.
To make matters worse, the King County Court system is under a backlog of hundreds of eviction cases. The Housing Justice project, the pro-bono legal aid group assisting Kim, is coming under criticism. The organization’s lawyers are being accused of using delay tactics in court, buying their clients more time to live in rental properties without paying rent.
King County GOP Chair Mathew Patrick Thomas is calling on elected officials to hold this arm of the King County Bar Association accountable.
“Hey Dow Constantine, hey Claudia Balducci,” Thomas says, “we’re calling for an audit of why this system is broken.”
Kim did not answer the door, and he has added a new surveillance camera and “no trespassing” signs to the property.
Protesters eventually took to the streets and met up with Singh, who symbolically covered his mouth with cloth to represent his voice being stifled. Singh remains resilient and says that at this point, he has no other choice than to continue to fight for his home.