Tenant Says Roanoke Owner OK'd Illegal Walls

Through an interpreter at Rye Town Court this morning, renter Hector Mattiaccio said his landlord told him to put up the illegal walls discovered at in the residence.

Mattiaccio, who did not have an attorney, plead guilty and paid two $250 fines for village code violations at the house he says he has rented for more than a year.

The renter told Judge Anthony Provenzano he didn't know it was illegal to put up the partitions, and that he did so at the instruction of his landlord Maria L. Martinez to rent out portions of the home. 

Mattiaccio said he put up the walls himself five months ago and that Martinez had seen them "many times" since then. 

Mattiaccio said that after he and his wife had been living in the house for a year "two girls left the house" and he thought about leaving at that time also. He was not clear about his relationship to the two women who moved out, but said that the owner asked him to stay on and rent the upstairs rooms.

He said he put up the walls because "his wife became afraid for her safety." 

Mattiaccio paid the $500 fine right after the hearing.

Homeowner Maria Martinez, who also appeared in court this morning, denied giving Mattiaccio permission to construct the walls. When asked about Mattiaccio telling the judge he had permission to put up the walls and rent the upstairs rooms, Martinez said, "I did not do that."

Rye Brook police are currently investigating the Sept. 18 shooting, in which two men were injured, one shot in the buttocks and the other in the head. Police said after the incident that a robbery led to the shooting.

The Roanoke Avenue home where the shooting occurred has been under investigation before. Martinez was fined in 2006 for overcrowding at the home, which is zoned as a single-family dwelling.