A Villager’s tree-trimming arrest last week appears to be tied to her neighbor’s deed compliance case.
The day after 78-year-old Janice Frances McKee of the Village of Hacienda East was arrested for trespassing and criminal mischief, her neighbor’s property was the subject of a public hearing before the Community Development District 1 Board of Supervisors at Savannah Center.
McKee, who lives at 1301 Fontana Court, has property that backs up to the residence of William Calabrese at 1302 Corona Ave.
Sumter County sheriff’s deputies had responded five times to disputes involving the warring neighbors, culminating in McKee’s arrest on June 8 after the Buffalo, N.Y. native allegedly went onto Calabrese’s property “and began cutting his tree down with tree loppers,” according to the arrest report. Calabrese provided deputies with a photo of McKee on his property, next to the tree with “tree loppers and a garbage can.” The tree was 19 feet from the neighbors’ mutual property line.
McKee, who acknowledged she had been warned multiple times to stay off Calabrese’s property, claimed she “needed to cut down the tree in order to have an effective survey completed.” She showed deputies a satellite image of the property but “had drawn a new line on the image with a pen, cutting through his residence and claiming half of his house was hers also.”
She had previously taken the shears to Calabrese’s peach tree, but it was so close to the property line that no arrest was made in that incident. The arrest report indicated that McKee has no previous criminal history.
Calabrese’s deed compliance violation, which was the subject of the hearing last week, involved a landscaping bed next to the driveway and in the road right of way. He has addressed the issue and his property is now back in compliance. Calabrese was also found to have put down landscaping in 2017 without Architectural Review Committee approval. He purchased the home in 2007 for $260,000.
McKee and her husband purchased their home in 2016 for $258,000. He died one year later.
She remains free on $2,000 bond.