In the past, the woman had a landlord who would let her pay in installments when she couldn’t make rent on time or needed help purchasing a pricey item for her home.
He was sympathetic to her tight financial situation. They had a good landlord-tenant relationship.
“So when Anthony Hubbard said he wanted to help me, that’s what I thought he meant,” the Toledo woman said.
Her new landlord knew she was in a tough position and that stable housing was crucial in order for her to regain custody of her two children. He offered to accept a lower rent payment than what her lease agreement spelled out, she said. He offered to waive the water bill.
Then the middle-of-the-night text messages started, and the woman realized what her neighbor’s warning about her landlord meant.
Mr. Hubbard, also of Toledo, is accused in two separate complaints of sexually harassing the female tenant and coercing her to provide sexual acts in exchange for rent or repairs between 2013 and 2017. He is also accused of sending her unwelcome sexually explicit text messages throughout her time as a tenant, including asking for oral sex in exchange for payment of late fees.
The woman filed a complaint with the Ohio Civil Rights Commission with the help of Toledo’s Fair Housing Center in 2017. In 2018, the commission determined it was probable that Mr. Hubbard and No Joke Properties, Inc., violated the state’s anti-discrimination laws by tying her continued tenancy to various sexual acts.
The case is now pending with the Ohio Attorney General’s administrative law process in its civil rights section.
The woman is also one of four unnamed victims listed in a complaint filed Dec. 23 by the U.S. Department of Justice against Mr. Hubbard alleging he violated the Fair Housing Act. It is separate from the Ohio Civil Rights Commission case.
The three other victims could not be reached.
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, alleges that from at least 2007 to the present Mr. Hubbard sexually harassed female tenants of rental properties that he either owned or co-owned with three other defendants — his brother Jeffery Hubbard, his mother Ann Hubbard, and Pay Up, LLC.
The lawsuit states Mr. Hubbard served as an agent, co-owner, business partner, officer, or property manager for at least 35 properties since 2000, but U.S. officials focused on seven addresses in Toledo’s central city.
Mr. Hubbard acted as an agent for his three co-defendants while engaging in many of the various acts of harassment, according to the complaint. Officials contend his mother and brother either knew or should have known about the discriminatory housing practices and failed to act.
The accusations include that he refused to provide maintenance services or took other adverse housing actions such as eviction against female tenants who objected to or refused his sexual advances. He is also accused of entering the homes of female tenants without their consent and expressing a preference for renting to single female tenants.
“Those things just didn’t happen,” defense attorney Stephen Hartman said. He is representing Mr. Hubbard in the federal case.
“He categorically denies that he’s ever discriminated in his operation of his housing business. He looks forward to being vindicated in court,” Mr. Hartman said.
Mr. Hubbard did not return a call seeking comment nor did he answer the door at his listed address. His mother and brother also could not be reached.
But Mr. Hubbard did give a statement to the Ohio Civil Rights Commission, recorded in a July, 2018 memo, denying the woman’s allegations. He said he met her at a store on Bancroft Street and had consensual sex with her prior to her renting from him, but he denied any sexual relations continued during her tenancy.
“Respondent states that he knew about Charging Party’s domestic violence situation and that she was trying to get back and keep her kids,” the memo states. “Respondent states he told Charging Party that she should be careful as to who (men) she brings into the home because of her kids.”
The woman said Mr. Hubbard took advantage of her situation. She said she was desperate to get her kids back and then to maintain custody, and she complied with his advances because she feared losing her housing.
Marie Flannery, president and CEO of the Fair Housing Center in Toledo, did not want to comment specifically on the cases regarding Mr. Hubbard other than to say she is aware of the ongoing harassment of female tenants because the center provided assistance and support to one of his alleged victims.
She said sexual harassment can be used to deny people access to housing, which is illegal under the Fair Housing Act. It can happen to anyone, she said, and it can come in several forms.
Landlords, property managers, or maintenance staff may coerce or try to coerce tenants to perform sexual acts in exchange for rent, late fees, or home repairs. There is also what she called hostile environment harassment, where sexual contact doesn’t take place but a housing provider asks inappropriate questions, enters a tenant’s home without permission, or threatens to evict a tenant who does not respond favorably to sexual advances.
“The fact that someone actually has sex with somebody or engages in sexual activity under duress doesn’t mean that they weren’t sexually harassed,” Ms. Flannery added. “We’ve had cases where a woman refused and the landlord had the gas turned off, and it’s winter. There can be dire consequences for saying ‘no.’”
The Fair Housing Center has received 13 complaints of housing discrimination that involved sexual harassment since 2013. Ms. Flannery acknowledged it’s a low number, but she said she believes many cases aren’t reported.
Nationally, there were 897 housing-related harassment cases reported in 2018; 139 were on the basis of sex, according to figures from the National Fair Housing Alliance’s 2019 Fair Housing Trends Report.
“Women and single mothers most frequently experience sexual harassment, particularly when they are low-income and forced to live in precarious housing situations due to the lack of affordable housing options,” the report stated.
The Toledo woman who filed the Ohio Civil Rights Commission complaint that prompted the federal investigation said that was her experience.
“I didn’t have money for a deposit to move,” she said. “I felt like I was trapped.”
The Department of Justice’s complaint against Mr. Hubbard is the 12th lawsuit alleging a pattern or practice of sexual harassment in housing that the department has filed nationwide since it launched its Sexual Harassment in Housing Initiative in late 2017.
Ms. Flannery applauded the national efforts to crack down on sexual harassment in housing. She said any form of discrimination is demeaning, but sexual harassment cases can be particularly egregious.
“The sexual harassment victims, those are some of the most heart-wrenching and compelling stories. There’s just a vulnerability there,” she said. “The effects of it are just horrendous. People should be able to be secure and safe in their house. That’s what home is.”
When the woman read the federal lawsuit that outlined her story alongside those of three other tenants, she felt a mix of emotions. She felt validated, but she also wished her former landlord faced more than financial repercussions.
“If he was in jail, he would feel the same bondage that I felt,” she said. “I want him to feel trapped, just like he made me feel trapped.”
The woman moved out of the place she rented from Mr. Hubbard in 2017 while he was out of town. She changed her phone number, and she said she hasn’t heard from him since. She is still afraid of all landlords, though she said she mostly trusts her current one, and she is still scared to report maintenance issues because of the memory of the sexual favors she believed she needed to provide in exchange.
Sometimes the trauma boils over and she screams out, “I want my life back!” But she is working to heal.
She sought therapy and has sent her children to counseling. She attends church and multiple support groups. She journals frequently, and she has started talking about her experience.
“I never had a voice. Fair Housing pretty much drew that out of me. And God. And friends,” she said.
She said she wants to see the discrimination and harassment in housing stop and for perpetrators to be held accountable.
“What I would tell other women is that they’re not to blame,” she said. “No matter how hard it may seem, there is a way out. Report. Don’t give up.”
First Published January 20, 2020, 1:00 p.m.
