New Yorkers demanding more security cameras for protection in their buildings should be warned: Big Brother will be watching them, too.
George Otero found that out the hard way when his landlord Chaim Babad mounted a hidden camera in the hallway pointed right at Otero's apartment door.
Babad, who owns 200 apartments in the West Village, wanted to see if the highly desirable rent-stabilized apartment in a doorman building in Greenwich Village was Otero's primary residence, Babad's lawyer Jordan Sklar admitted in State Supreme Civil Court.
The evidence Babad caught on video showed that not only did Otero and his wife Georgia live in the apartment — he was bringing another woman there for afternoon encounters, according to court papers.
Otero, a sewing-notions mogul, apparently felt it was safe to unzip at home while Georgia ran their business in the Garment District.
That pattern continued until Otero realized that the "small rectangular box" mounted across the hall in 2010 was in fact "a covert electronic surveillance camera."
The lens was pointed directly at his doorway and into the entryway of his apartment, where his passion may have been recorded, according to the documents.
"If (Otero) wished to engage in intimate sexual activity in the open doorway of their apartment that is connected to a common hallway, he cannot reasonably expect that such conduct remains 'private,'" Sklar said in court papers.
Caught, Otero confessed the affair to his wife.
"George concluded that Babad had the woman on camera and therefore it would come out," Otero's lawyer Leonard Flamm told the Daily News. "He decided to inform his wife of this visitor. He wanted to break it to her rather than have her learn it from third parties. He felt it would better if the story came from him."
How did that go for him?
"She was not happy about it," Flamm said. "The marital relationship became strained."
You could say that.
Still, the Oteros were united on one front: they jointly sued Babad, asking for damages of $5 million each, not including $10,000 per year in psychiatric expenses; $2,500 per month for a second apartment; and $42,000 a year for the employee Otero had to hire to replace his wife when she quit.
They argued their privacy had been invaded, but Judge Lucy Billings threw that claim out.
"In today's world, there are surveillance cameras everywhere, and they are allowed in all public spaces and businesses," top liability lawyer Lawrence Rogak told The News.
The case is expected to be settled this week, but for now, the camera is still up. "Any landlord could determine in a couple of months whether a tenant lives in an apartment or not,” fumed Flamm. “This was overly intrusive -- it's abusive."
The Oteros did not return calls.
NY Daily News
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