Landlord rams SUV into home

NEWARK, Del. - August 1, 2008 (WPVI) -- New Castle County Police say a landlord rammed his car into a tenant's home.

There is a boot print left on an emotionally rattled woman's front door. This door was knocked completely out of its frame.

"He literally drove his Hummer over a bush into the house and then got out and proceeded to kick and run into the door with his body," the woman, who did not want to be identified, said.

The man is 30-year-old Richard Ott, the owner of the house in Harmony Woods where the woman says she thought she had a harmonious agreement Ott's brother, the property manager, about her overdue rent.

Police say the woman, her husband, and 6-year-old child have never met Richard Ott.

"The husband looked outside and says we're calling the police and the individual replies, I'm the landlord call the police and tell them that I did it," Cpl. Trinidad Navarro said.

When police confronted Richard Ott he first denied being here, but Navarro says it didn't take investigators long to figure out that wasn't the truth because parts of a bush were still in the grill of his hummer.

The woman said that Ott used the n word and told her to get out.

Ott faces a number of charges, but a hate crime is not among them.

"We're terrified to live here, I can't live here," the woman said.

Investigators at police headquarters will hand this case over to the Attorney General office where it is still very possible a hate crime could be added to the list of offenses.

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