Having been to the Suuq during the time discussed in Paul Weir's posting as well as Dean Zimmerman and Greg Luce's posts, maybe I can shed some more light on this matter. I am familiar with Ahmed Jama and Rukia Fatah, the shopkeepers of Sanag Fashions, #A114, who were received an eviction notice on Friday, February 13th.
Several weeks ago, Somali leaders contacted Jim Graham and ask him to assist some shop owners at the Suuq who claimed to be victimized by the owners/managers. A meeting was held where several shopowners pleaded for neighborhood assistance. Ahmed Jama and Rukia Fatah were among those who made that request. Ventura Village voted to have its executive committee investigate allegations of exploitation of businesses by Suuq owners/managers. As a Ventura Village Neighborhood Board Members and appointed as Secretary of Ventura Village, I got involved. Jim Graham and I met with Jama and Fatah at the Hennepin County Government Center where I had urged them to go to meet with Omar Jamal, Executive Director of the Somali Justice Advocacy Center (which recently was added to the Hennepin County Judicial Service Center). At that time, the evicted shopkeepers showed us several documents which will be important in this discussion. First, they showed us a receipt that shows that they paid their rent for #A114 for February, 2004. Secondly, they showed us a document revealing that the eviction was based on allegations of "subletting their shop" and "no possession of insurance". According to Jama and Fatah, they had never received any official summons to court, where they ended up being listed as "no shows". They said they never even knew that a court action was being initiated against them. No "in person" service of the summons was issued to them, they allege. According to other Somali shopkeepers, all the mail going to the Suuq goes to the management company. Therefore, if the management company wants to win in court, they could simply make sure that the shopkeepers don't get the summons being mailed to them. Then the courtroom officials figure that the defendents simply decided not to appear, which triggers an automatic decision to the benefit of the plaintiffs. That's why a service of the summons provided to the defendents is so crucial to any justice in the courts. Greg Luce wrote in his posting, "The court hearing appears to have been February 6, 2004, which is extremely quick for an eviction hearing for a non-payment case filing that occurred one week prior. Typically, the court hearings are 14 days from the date of filing. Why this one was seven days is beyond me." Indeed things are unusual, and an inquiry must be made as to the whole sequence of events surrounding this issue. If the on-line database Greg relies on said, "...the filing was for non-payment of rent," this is at variance as to what the actually document shown to me indicates. Does this mean that Hennepin County also has it wrong? Dean Zimmerman wrote, "When I arrived at the suuq,somewhere between 1pm and 2pm, I found the employees of the suuq owner inside the merchant's stall boxing up the merchant's possession[s]." I followed Dean and John Kolstad into the Suuq and photographed the police at the door of #A114: Sanag Fashions. A red Sheriff's notice was posted at the door and translucent plastic was stretched over the doorway to block any view inside. I pushed it aside and snapped a couple of photos of people inside boxing up the merchandise. Then I left to go outside where Ahmed Jama and Rukia Fatah were standing. They were not permitted inside under threat of arrest and were standing with Jim Graham outside the building. Dean Zimmerman writes: "At my suggestion, the suuq owners opened the doors to the space to allow Jim Graham and others from the Ventura Village Neighborhood Organization to photograph the scene and to photograph the people who were actually doing the work of boxing up the merchandise.â Actually, I was just coming back inside the building with another Somali shopkeeper when the police asked me to photograph inside #A114. I did so to record the packed boxes prior to being taken to a secure place for storage according to MN Statute. Jim Graham never stepped inside the building, but rather stayed outside with Jama and Fatah. One of the most important things I observed was that each of the stalls or shops in the Suuq have walls that only go up eight feet. The ceiling of the Suuq is approximately ten feet. I cannot imagine how anybody could get insurance with such a gap above the stalls. A fire would probably pass quickly between stalls and conceivably, a thief could crawl over the walls to steal merchandise. So I would like to see some evidence that any of the shopkeepers can get insurance for their shops. Dean Zimmerman writes: "Omar Jamal, some Somali elders, the police and I spent the next couple of hours speaking with the suuq owners and other merchants about what was going on and about how the eviction process works. When I left, sometime after 4pm, things were calm, there were no TV cameras nor demonstrations going on. Your post is the first that I heard of TV cameras and demonstrations." Those of us not party to Dean's meeting with the owners, returned outside where we were joined by numerous Somali shopkeepers. John Bergin and two of the Sabri brothers were also outside during this period. A bit later, Channel 11 and Channel 5 television crews did show up and recorded interviews with Ahmed Jama and Rukia Fatah and Omar Jamal who had earlier met with Dean. I photographed the crowd and the television interviews so I can attest that Paul Weir's query is accurate. In fact, I took a disc of the 50 photos I shot over to Paul Weir today so he could see for himself what had happened on Sunday. I also gave him permission to post any of the photos he thought would help the community better understand the issues surrounding the eviction of Ahmed Jama and Rukia Fatah. Obviously, this matter is not over, because there is too strong a disparity between information given by Bergin/Sabri and the evicted shopkeepers. I've heard that many other shopkeepers have refused to open their shops until there is greater resolution to this issue. I cannot confirm this. Maybe some of the Somali people will join this Issues Forum and speak for themselves... Yesterday I urged many of the assembled shopkeepers I spoke with, that on Tuesday, February 16th they should march down to the US Post Office and DEMAND of the Postmaster that they be provided with direct mail service instead of their mail being handed over to the management company of the Suuq for distribution. I further suggested that each of them contact a commercial insurance carrier/broker to determine whether anybody can actually get insurance in there. I also hope that the City of Minneapolis gets serious in ascertaining the safety of the Suuq system where the shops are so interconnected. One of my photographs from another of the shops shows a use of extension cords across the ceiling that should be totally forbidden in a place like that. I have contacted Jim Graham and asked him to comment on the requests made to him by those shopkeepers and add to any discussions in any of these postings. I will forward his comments to the Minneapolis Issues Form. REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
