The Cascade Team Blog

A Pennsylvania couple is suing a neighbor — who once pleaded guilty to sexually molesting their daughter — trying to get a court to force the man to buy their $350,000 home.  

The child’s parents say they don’t want to live next door to the man, and their lawsuit charges that they are “under duress to move” and that his presence next door is “ultra-hazardous given the close proximity.” In their lawsuit, the parents assert their home is “virtually unmarketable” because of having a registered sex offender living next door. 

The neighbor, Oliver Beck, pleaded guilty to indecent assault of a child under 13 in September 2011. He was given a three-to-23-month prison sentence. Once released from prison, he moved back to his home next door to the victim.  

Beck’s attorney has asked a judge to dismiss the lawsuit, arguing that it’s against the law to force his client to buy a home. 

But the attorney for the child’s parents argue that a legal precedent has been set to force the man to buy the house. In 1998, a state appeals court ruled that a plaintiff who lived next to a toxic-waste site could collect damages due to the inability to sell the home. 

Source: “Molester Should Buy Victim’s House So She Can Move, Suit Says,” Associated Press (March 21, 2013)