July 17, 2025
Authorized consultants emphasize that becoming a member of an HOA constitutes a non-public contract.
A Hillsborough County house owner endured every week in jail after being arrested for what started as a seemingly minor owners’ affiliation (HOA) violation regarding her garden. Irena Inexperienced’s unusual and inappropriate incarceration has solid a harsh highlight on the authority of HOAs and the escalating disputes that may ensnare residents.
Inexperienced’s incarceration started dramatically on Could 23, when a Hillsborough County Sheriff’s deputy pulled her over after the Florida mother picked up her 15-year-old daughter. She was handcuffed and brought to Orient Street Jail, the place she discovered there was no bond, forcing her to spend seven days behind bars.
Her crime? Brown grass that her HOA in Riverview’s Creek View subdivision stored issuing violations for.
Inexperienced described the humiliation of being fingerprinted and having her mugshot taken, lamenting, “It makes me really feel horrible to be taken to jail and to be handled like that for brown grass at my own residence. That’s horrible.”
She even recalled a surreal interplay with one other inmate who, upon listening to her cost, mistakenly thought she was jailed for marijuana.
The saga commenced with notices from the HOA’s administration firm, The Trowbridge Firm, citing points that quickly expanded past the garden.
“The grass has began turning brown. So then they began sending notes. And it went from the grass being brown to there’s a dent in my storage,” The Florida house owner defined. She was additionally cited for a mailbox coated in mildew and for parking a industrial cargo van.
Authorized consultants emphasize that becoming a member of an HOA constitutes a non-public contract.
“This can be a non-public contract that individuals select to enter into,” famous land use knowledgeable and Stetson Legislation Faculty Professor Paul Boudreaux, highlighting the HOA’s proper to implement guidelines on property look and use.
After Inexperienced failed to answer a mediation request, the HOA initiated a lawsuit in Hillsborough County Civil Courtroom. Inexperienced, representing herself, submitted a handwritten response that was rejected.
Throughout a July listening to, a decide issued an ultimatum, “My grass needed to be brung as much as par… if it’s not completed in 30 days, you’re gonna go to jail,” Inexperienced recalled.
Inexperienced maintains she complied, promoting her van, cleansing her mailbox, and seeding her grass. Nevertheless, she missed a subsequent courtroom date in August, claiming that she had not been personally served with a discover to seem. “Nothing was despatched to my dwelling,” she asserted.
Consequently, the decide signed a contempt of courtroom order and issued an arrest warrant on the request of the HOA’s lawyer, Francis Friscia. “I feel it’s fairly uncommon in a civil case for somebody to have a contempt order,” Boudreaux commented.
The annoyed house owner attributed her browning grass to a big tree close to her sidewalk and the necessary watering restrictions imposed final 12 months as a result of drought. A two-month moratorium on watering the grass, permitting watering solely as soon as every week, was enacted in July 2024. Regardless of her yard being, in her view, removed from the worst in Riverview’s Creek View subdivision, Inexperienced expressed that she’s the one house owner identified to have been jailed over such infractions.
“I feel they’ve manner an excessive amount of energy. I’ve by no means heard of something like this in my life,” Inexperienced acknowledged, recounting her ordeal.
David Lehr, a Palm Seashore lawyer specializing in circumstances towards HOAs, acknowledged the decide’s proper to problem the order however advised “extra lenient treatments” may exist. “You may have an HOA who was fast to go after her and to make use of the total drive that they’re entitled to,” Lehr noticed.
Inexperienced’s sister-in-law, a paralegal, filed an emergency listening to petition. Inexperienced appeared in courtroom shackled. A unique decide presided, and regardless of the HOA lawyer’s opposition, the decide ordered Inexperienced’s speedy launch. “He needed me to proceed to take a seat in jail and never come dwelling to my household,” Inexperienced acknowledged [Source: Irena Green, direct quote]. She was launched the next day.
The Creek View HOA, via its lawyer Francis Friscia, offered a press release asserting Inexperienced obtained violation notices and disregarded them. They acknowledged that authorized motion was filed after she declined mediation, and her failure to seem at a subsequent courtroom date led to the issuance of an arrest warrant.
“The Courtroom took these steps as a result of Ms. Inexperienced’s failure to adjust to the Courtroom’s directions. That is all public document,” the assertion concluded.
Authorized consultants underscore the teachings from Inexperienced’s case.
“Generally they act in a petty method, but when they resolve that you should do one thing, you should observe the principles. And when a decide tells you to do one thing, it’s a must to do it,” Boudreaux suggested.
Lehr added, “Take it severely. Perhaps seek the advice of an lawyer.”
Inexperienced herself mirrored, “I undoubtedly want I’d have employed a lawyer.”
The incident additionally highlights broader legislative efforts to curb HOA energy. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed Home Invoice 1203 in June 2024, enacting sweeping modifications to HOA authority geared toward defending owners. The brand new legislation prohibits HOAs from imposing guidelines that, amongst different issues, restrict what homeowners do with the inside of their properties, ban vegetable gardens or clotheslines that aren’t seen from the road, or prohibit the parking of non-public autos in driveways.
It additionally prohibits compound curiosity on overdue assessments and fines for rubbish cans left on the curb inside 24 hours of assortment or for vacation decorations left up longer than governing paperwork permit, until written discover is offered for over every week. State Home Consultant Kimberly Daniels, who championed the invoice, famous a “stream of individuals” statewide complaining about HOAs. “We’d like HOAs, however what we do want is to really feel like our properties are our properties,” Daniels asserted.
She particularly added a provision to ban compound curiosity on unpaid fines after working with a house owner whose debt ballooned from $11,000 to $90,000 in a single 12 months as a result of such charges.
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