ATLANTIC BEACH, SC (WBTW) – Tenants who live in an Atlantic Beach apartment complex the Horry County solicitor declared a nuisance will be in court Monday.
Police say during an undercover investigation in November 2018, they found illegal drug and gang activity in the apartment building.
An Horry County judge ordered the complex to close down for one year in response to the solicitor’s nuisance complaint.
Some tenants filed motions asking the judge to reverse the order to close down. The court documents filed state some tenants were not given ample time to move out, cannot afford to move, and some say they were not involved in the criminal activity.
“It’s about a right and wrong thing. When you let the actions of a few affect the many, I just think that’s wrong,” Chris Drumgoole, a tenant at the Ocean Apartments said in a News13 interview in June.
One tenant wrote in an affidavit that if she is forced to move, she and her fiancé will likely lose their jobs, and she may lose custody of her children.
Others state they may become homeless if the Ocean Apartments are shut down.
However, 15th Circuit Court solicitor Jimmy Richardson says they gave the complex owner more than a month’s notice to notify its residents about the complaint. He says the nuisance action was not filed against the individual tenants, but the building itself because it was being used to make and sell drugs.
On July 16, police arrested four people who live at the complex for drugs and other illegal activity, according to police records.
“We really do just want to abate the problem so that the neighbors don’t have to put up with bad neighbors,” Richardson said in an interview with News13 in February.
The building was supposed to close down by July 15, but some tenants are still living at the Ocean Apartments until a final decision can be made.
