A component-time New York couple say $70,000 value of their belongings had been “intentionally left to rot” by knowledgeable storage firm — which didn’t inform them of the moldy, smelly injury till transferring day, in accordance with a brand new lawsuit.
Dennis and Ashleigh Ellis had been floored to study that their issues, together with furnishings, clothes and even their wedding ceremony album, had been “presumably” allowed to take a seat in standing water for months by Flat Rate Movers and Storage, in accordance with Ashleigh and the couple’s Manhattan Supreme Court lawsuit from Wednesday.
The pair, who primarily dwell in Los Angeles, mentioned they had been greeted with “the stench of rot” when the corporate dropped off their bins at their new West End condominium on Dec. 19, the submitting says.
“When the things arrived, they arrived completely moldy and damaged — just unrecognizable,” Ashleigh, a former aggressive determine skater, advised The Post. “We had a beautiful home that we loved. I remember seeing it for the first time and I just broke out into tears.”
She added, “I know it’s just material things but there were a lot of sentimental things too from our wedding, our wedding gifts, pieces of art that were commissioned — just priceless items that we will never get back.”
Ashleigh, who married her lawyer hubby in 2019, mentioned another sentimental objects like their wedding ceremony album, household images and a household tree guide they obtained as a marriage present had been additionally ruined.
After the Ellises refused to simply accept the ruined belongings, the corporate, in addition to the Ellises’ house insurance coverage firm State Farm, mentioned they wouldn’t cowl the damages.
The couple’s swimsuit, which additionally names State Farm as a defendant, accuses Flat Rate of getting the “audacity to show up at delivery with a truckload of moldy, damaged and destroyed property that had obviously been intentionally left to rot for months, yet acted as if nothing was wrong.”
Ashleigh slammed Flat Rate for not standing behind their phrase.
“You expect to hire a professional company and when they show up — the stuff is green and moldy and they are not trying to compensate us at all,” Ashleigh mentioned.
Dennis — a companion on the agency dealing with his swimsuit, Ellis George Cipollone — and Ashleigh determined to maneuver Big Apple residences since they’d a 1-year-old son and wanted extra space to accommodate the larger household.
“Now we have an empty house and we have no furniture,” Ashleigh mentioned. “We don’t have a bed. I have an 18-month-old son but no crib.”
“This was Christmastime,” she mentioned. “Everything is on back order. We are now just starting to get furniture. It was a nightmare.”
The firm claimed that all the Ellises’ issues that it had been storing for eight months from their former Lincoln Center-area condominium had been solely value $5,000 after they had been truly value $70,000, the submitting claims.
Flat Rate additionally gave “every excuse under the sun” to get out of paying for the injury, telling the couple it wasn’t their fault and that “no one can control mother nature” whereas not admitting or explaining how the injury occurred, the submitting alleges.
The Ellises paid Flat Rate $2,500 for the supply of their belongings, along with $500 per 30 days for storage since April 19, 2021. And the couple has been devoted clients of State Farm since 2007, having paid the insurer roughly $500,000 in premiums, the swimsuit claims.
“Flat Rate’s intentional destruction of the Ellis property by leaving it, presumably, exposed to or in standing water and moisture for months assuring that nothing could be salvaged constituted an intentional and unauthorized destruction and defacement of the Ellis Property akin to vandalism,” the swimsuit fees.
Flat Rate lawyer David Giampietro advised The Post that the corporate doesn’t touch upon pending litigation however mentioned, “we will say that this matter is stemming from the historic storm, Hurricane Ida.”
Ellis lawyer Jeffrey Mitchell advised The Post that even when the late August storm was in charge for the injury, the corporate didn’t name the Ellises to inform them what had occurred on the time, nor did it make any makes an attempt to dry out and salvage their property.
“They didn’t pull any of it out, they didn’t call a remediation company to dry it out,” Mitchell mentioned. “They took no effort to salvage anything that could be salvaged.”
“They just left it there in its condition to rot and then they delivered it to the customer and washed their hands of their responsibility,” the lawyer claimed.
State Farm didn’t instantly return a request for remark.
The post NY couple has $70K worth of stuff ruined by moving company: suit first appeared on Umorr.
