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HANOVER TWP. — A landlord from Hanover Township is facing charges he allegedly yelled racial epithets at a tenant.
Frank Castrignano, 64, of River Road, Hanover Green, banged on a door of an apartment building he owns on Lee Park Avenue in Hanover Township yelling derogatory comments directed at a black woman on Oct. 3, according to court records.
Castrignano had posted an eviction notice but the woman appealed and was permitted by a district judge to remain in the apartment, court records say.
After the woman won the appeal from being evicted, court records say, Castrignano showed up at the apartment building, banged on the door yelling, “It’s the (expletive) owner,” and called the woman racial epithets several times before driving away.
Police in court records allege Castrignano posted a sign with a racial epithet on a window of the woman’s apartment, and wrote a racial epithet on the mailbox to the woman’s apartment.
The sign Castrignano allegedly posted on the window referred to the woman not paying rent, court records say.
During a phone call between police and Castrignano, court records say, he yelled and claimed it was his “freedom of speech,” and “that’s what happens when you don’t pay rent, you get what I wrote on the mailbox.”
Castrignano is charged with ethnic intimidation and harassment and is scheduled for a preliminary hearing Dec. 4 at Luzerne County Central Court.