I'm hoping my darling wife doesn't see this story. The last thing I need is for her to start hearing sounds in the attic.

Almost immediately after Rebecca Peña moved into her house in Old East Dallas last month, strange things began to happen.

The chandelier would rattle. Once, when she was playing dominoes, she saw water begin to slosh – Jurassic Park-like – in a glass. She heard footsteps at night.

A family member suggested it was ghosts, but Ms. Peña was skeptical.

"I said, 'No, man, the footsteps are too heavy for ghosts,' " said Ms. Peña , 25, manager of a dry-cleaning business.

She thought it was more likely to be an animal.

But when she and her boyfriend took a flashlight and finally investigated the attic earlier this week, they discovered that they could definitely rule out mice.

She said the attic had been cordoned off with cloth. Beer and water bottles, a blanket and old shirts were littered about.

In short, someone had been living there, apparently sneaking out when Ms. Peña went to work and sneaking back before she returned.

She believes the intruder would jimmy the front door, walk through her living room and up the stairs.

"I work 12 hours a day, and nobody's there. My kids are in day-care," she said. "Somebody could do it and not get caught."

Could someone really get away with something like this? It looks like they may have, if the rest of the story is correct. Peñafrightened the guy out of the house, but he seems to have gotten back in. What happened when teh police came is even stranger.

When she went back in her house, she said, she thought she heard more noises coming from the attic – either the man had not really left, or someone else was up there.

According to the police report, Ms. Peña went into the attic and saw the man. She told him to leave, but he refused. She locked the door leading to the attic until police arrived, the report says.

Police said they searched the attic and found signs someone had been living there but were unable to find anyone.

Ms. Peña said that when they came back downstairs, she and the police heard more noises coming from upstairs, but a second search also came up empty.

On the advice of police, Ms. Peña had the attic door boarded up. When she left for work on Friday, she kept the television turned on.

I'm sure that there is some "public interest lawyer" preparing a suit right now, accusing Ms. Peña of violating the civil rights of the former resident of her attic. I mean, he isn't really an intruder who has been breaking and entering her house in violation of the law -- he is merely an undocumented resident willing to live in place Americans don't want to live.

Posted by: Greg at 08:53 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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