A fed-up Queens landlord posted two giant banners calling out his tenants for allegedly owing him $17,000 in back rent. “MY TENANTS ON THE FIRST FLOOR ARE NOT PAYING RENT” read the bold posters above the first-floor rental on 175th Street in Springfield Gardens. Landlords Calvin and Jean Thompson posted the banners in the hopes of shaming their tenants into paying their rent. The banners were featured in a TikTok video that has since gone viral.The Thompsons have owned the two-family home since 1989 and began the process of trying to evict Marie and Eugene Lamour and their daughter Kathia in court last month.

However, with almost 200,000 eviction cases pending in the city since the pandemic protections and the state’s eviction moratorium created a backlog. This has caused some landlords to use humiliation as the next-best tactic to get rent paid.

“The signs are very embarrassing and shameful for them,” said the Thompsons’ son, Calvin Jr. “That’s the only voice we have at this stage: freedom of speech.”

The signs seem to be working: Kathia Lamour attempted to cut one sign down, Calvin Jr. said.

“When she calls Uber, she won’t do it in front of the house anymore,” he said. “She runs to the end of the block, so they don’t see them.

“It’s uncomfortable that we have to hang these up, but we’re $20,000 uncomfortable, so I think a sign is very minor.”

Problems started in July when the Thompsons raised the rent on the Lamours’ three-bedroom pad from $1,800 a month to $1,900, the first rent hike in nine years, Calvin Jr. says.

The Lamours didn’t want to pay the 5% increase. Kathia, who works for the city Department of Social Services, told The New York Post she attempted to drop off $1,800 in rent instead of the new amount, however, Thompsons refused to take it. Then she stopped paying all together.

“It’s like all of the sudden, we’re bad tenants,” Kathia said, who has been on unpaid medical leave from her job since the summer. “They were bamboozling me into an increase. They went ballistic on me because I wouldn’t give it to them.”

“I don’t think a $100 increase for almost a decade of living is unreasonable,” Calvin Jr. said. “There are plenty of landlords in our situation because of COVID. A lot of eviction cases are backlogged. She knows this and is going to ride this out.”

The state’s eviction moratorium, ended in January, gave wide latitude to renters suffering hardship from the pandemic. The Lamours’ attorney, Andreas Spiker, says the sign is a form of harassment and will only hurt the Thompsons’ case according to the newspaper.

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