Adele Andaloro grew up in her family's home in the Flushing neighborhood of Queens in New York City. Recently, after her parents passed away, she inherited the million-dollar property when they left it to her in their will. She dutifully went about preparing the house for sale and put it up on the market. That's when everything began to go sideways. Three squatters broke into the home at night and set up residence, causing significant damage to the building and removing the "For Sale" sign from the yard. When Andaloro found out, she returned and changed the locks, seeking to have them removed. But the level of insanity in this story only increased when the police responded by arresting Adele Andaloro instead of the squatters. Now the tale has taken another strange turn. Two men whom the New York Post describes as "vigilantes" showed up at the house on Tuesday and attempted to forcibly evict them. 

A pair of vigilantes allegedly tried to forcefully evict three squatters from a million-dollar Queens home after the homeowner was arrested when she changed the locks and tried to remove them.

Two unidentified men driving a black pickup truck pulled into the driveway of the Flushing’s home searching for the squatters Tuesday afternoon, according to the Daily Mail.

“We are looking to get this guy out,” one of the men angrily said, a neighbor shared with the outlet. “I am here to talk to him. I want to see why he is here.”

The effort to remove the squatters was unsuccessful and they are reportedly still in the home. Meanwhile, the police are insisting that Andaloro needs to resolve the matter in housing court because it's considered "a landlord-tenant" issue. In any sane jurisdiction, such a ridiculous proposition would never even be suggested, but unfortunately, this is all unfolding in New York City. Sanity isn't particularly common there.

In order to be a "tenant" there needs to be a lease or at least some sort of agreement between the renter and property owner or manager. In this case, there was absolutely no question as to the ownership of the property. Andaloro has the deed to the home and she was named as the inheritor in her parents' will. The squatters never contacted her prior to breaking in. They are not tenants. They are guilty of breaking and entering.

But none of that may wind up mattering. As it turns out, New York City has a law declaring that people can declare "squatters' rights" after living on a property for just thirty days. It would take more than 30 days for Adele Andaloro to get a date in housing court even if she had begun the process on the day the thieves moved in. If they can find a lawyer willing to take up their case, they can begin court proceedings and tie up the home for months if not years. Ms. Andaloro told reporters that she is sincerely fearful that she may wind up losing her family home.

New York City's soft-on-crime leaders are responsible for these insane laws being on the books. In what universe would someone believe that people can be entitled to "property rights" based on a case of breaking and entering after only one month? For that matter, there should be no amount of time after which squatters are given any sort of legal standing. Ms. Andaloro should become the poster child for a movement in New York to banish that law from the books and the police need to drag those squatters out of there and down to a jail cell where they belong.