Jarndyce v Jarndyce
December 20, 2018 9:22 AM   Subscribe

These wealthy neighbors have been at war for nearly 25 years -- In a beachfront enclave north of Boston, the battle has been waged with harsh words, pricey lawyers, and smelly porta potties.
posted by Chrysostom (17 comments total) 7 users marked this as a favorite
 
Feeling increasingly powerless, Wile decided to fight back with some street justice. He dumped piles of rusted scrap metal, a crane bucket, and other construction debris along the property line where it would be in view of Horvitz’s pool. He hauled in an unsightly shipping container, and after Horvitz installed shrubs and then a fence, Wile simply piled the junk on top of the container.

At one point, Horvitz filed a complaint accusing Wile of exposing himself to him — “like I was mooning him,” Wile says, “but I was able to produce receipts showing I was on the Vineyard that day.”


All this needs is for the Stugots - blaring Dean Martin - to make an appearance.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 9:50 AM on December 20, 2018 [2 favorites]


I vote we knock down all the structures, eat the rich, and leave the beach to the plovers and other wildlife.
posted by bagel at 9:54 AM on December 20, 2018 [22 favorites]


Oh man, these two douchecanoes are the worst. The only one I feel sorry for is the wife.
posted by corb at 10:01 AM on December 20, 2018 [2 favorites]


"If I have to come up there and make this decision for you, neither one of you kids is going to like it"--Climate Change
posted by thivaia at 10:20 AM on December 20, 2018 [14 favorites]


The onus is on the legal system too, for being a tool of the rich, and enabling this nonsense. Everything in the whole story should be burned to the ground.
posted by The_Vegetables at 10:23 AM on December 20, 2018 [4 favorites]


I once attended a party at the beautiful home of wealthy people in a neighborhood that long ago overlooked a lushly planted park. Along the backyard property line of this home, on the neighbor's property, was an strange, effigy mound-like hill, robed in grass, at its base maybe 30 feet long, 15 feet wide, and eight feet in height.

Local legend claims that, sometime in the Twenties, before the Crash, that property was purchased and the mound erected solely to spoil the view of the original owner of the house where I was attending the party.

If true, the cubic yards of petty, privileged grievance piled there offered a sad subject for contemplation. However. According to the host, neighborhood children now use it for games - tag, king of the hill - and for sledding in winter. A redemption of sorts, perhaps.
posted by Caxton1476 at 10:36 AM on December 20, 2018 [8 favorites]


My friend works at a prestigious law firm in a wealthy city (not as a lawyer), and tells me how the bulk of their cases are rich people suing other rich people for over petty problems and greed. Often times people in the same family. Just ripping each other apart, over money, which they already have more of than I'll ever have. I hope the ocean eats them all, honestly.
posted by wellifyouinsist at 10:42 AM on December 20, 2018 [7 favorites]


Horvitz sounds like the biggest douchecanoe here.
Wile — who calls himself charitably minded, regularly volunteering his pilot services for a nonprofit called Flying Santa — would let large groups of kids and counselors from the local YMCA use his beach without his being present. That was until one summer day in 2002, when Beverly’s then-mayor, Tom Crean, ordered police to shut down one such YMCA party and usher a couple hundred kids, included several dozen with disabilities, off the property.
It sounds less petty on Wile's part and more rightful anger that he's spent decades fighting Horvitz after he finally got the legal right to build...I just have a hard time feeling like both of these guys are equally at fault.
posted by the thorn bushes have roses at 10:42 AM on December 20, 2018 [11 favorites]


Yeah, the oily, twee dynastically-wealthy art collector seems by far the more cartoonishly villianous of the two men in this scenario. Scrappy roughneck contractor guy just wants to build his house, and it’s become a matter of principle for him at this point.

Laws, courts and property rights are there, most fundamentally, to protect the wealthy from being eaten, but they work less well when both sides in the dispute have a lot of money and lawyers to toss around.
posted by killdevil at 10:56 AM on December 20, 2018 [3 favorites]


I hate the Boston Globe's paywall so much. I would dump debris and portapotties on top of it.
posted by ChuraChura at 11:00 AM on December 20, 2018 [7 favorites]


It sounds less petty on Wile's part and more rightful anger that he's spent decades fighting Horvitz after he finally got the legal right to build...I just have a hard time feeling like both of these guys are equally at fault.

The really telling point here is one that they both (largely) agree on:

Wile decided to pivot. “Jeffrey, I’m a businessman. Make me an offer.” It was no secret that Wile’s winning bid had been $335,000. So when Horvitz offered to take it off his hands for well below that price, Wile knew he was in trouble.

But [Horvitz] recalls Wile offering to sell him the lot for $500,000 and his countering for not much more than the $335,000 Wile had paid at auction. It was unbuildable, Horvitz says, so it wasn’t that valuable.

Horvitz could've bought Wile out for $500,000. Hell he probably could've, at that point, bargained Wile down to $400,000-$425,000 or so. Neither one would've been thrilled with the outcome but they both would've accepted it. And Horvitz could've afforded it. But instead Horvitz decided he'd rather wage an open-ended and who-knows-how-expensive legal battle to spite Wile just because things hadn't gone the way he wanted them to go. But he's definitely spent millions on this by now. That's an awful lot of money to spend out of spite.

This also predisposed me not to like Horvitz though:

As part of my due diligence in preparation for my meeting with Horvitz, I had gone to the Essex County Probate Court to request a copy of his divorce settlement — divorces are public record in Massachusetts — but was told it had been impounded long ago. When I later sat down with Horvitz, he told me: “I understand someone has been asking for my divorce settlement. I assume that was you.” I replied that he must have good friends on staff there, since clearly some government employee had dutifully dropped a dime.

As somebody who's spent a fair amount of time in the Essex County Probate Court looking up old records, that all sounds sketchy as hell to me. Now I'm gonna wonder who behind the counter is gonna drop a dime on me if I someday happen to need the "wrong" file.

Add to that, the guy creepily inserting himself into the Wiles' divorce and...well, I'm sure Evan Wile is no saint (he sounds almost cartoonishly like the stereotype of the pushy developer) but Horvitz just gives me the heebie jeebies.
posted by mstokes650 at 11:59 AM on December 20, 2018 [4 favorites]


Horvitz' father seems to be the only reasonable one.
posted by AugustWest at 12:07 PM on December 20, 2018 [1 favorite]


At least they're only fucking themselves over; at least it's just money. You get these same kinda assholes running a couple of countries, people wind up dying just for spite's sake.
posted by seanmpuckett at 12:19 PM on December 20, 2018 [2 favorites]


I don't understand the point of the author pointing out that Horvitz has a disabled daughter. He mentioned it not just once, but twice. The second time, with awe that the daughter had somehow been able to get her masters despite her disabilities.
posted by hydra77 at 5:35 PM on December 20, 2018 [1 favorite]


I hate the Boston Globe's paywall so much. I would dump debris and portapotties on top of it.

If you clear your cookies from bostonglobe.com you can read more.
posted by bendy at 8:47 PM on December 20, 2018 [1 favorite]


Scrappy roughneck contractor guy just wants to build his house,

Did you see the part where he ditched his wife as soon as she got ill to run off with his girlfriend, giving this piece of land that is in an ongoing legal battle to her as her part of their joint property?
posted by corb at 9:01 PM on December 20, 2018 [1 favorite]


hydra77: "I don't understand the point of the author pointing out that Horvitz has a disabled daughter. He mentioned it not just once, but twice. The second time, with awe that the daughter had somehow been able to get her masters despite her disabilities. "

I think he mentioned it the first time because Wile, in trying to at least be nice before he started asking for permits, offered to fly the daughter to Boston in an emergency anytime in his helicopter.

Horvitz is unlikable from the beginning. It becomes apparent as the story goes on, as corb points out, that Wile is not exactly the pillar of integrity either.

I really want to read Horvitz' divorce decree from his 1st wife. There is a reason he has it hidden.

But really, the more you think about this article and the whole story, the less you give a hoot about any of them. I feel like taking a shower after reading about these two jamokes.
posted by AugustWest at 9:35 PM on December 20, 2018


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