Blighted properties draw Atlanta mayor’s attention

MAY 18, 2015 ATLANTA Rick Warren leaves court following the hearing. Warren, the Buckhead investor who has bought up some 10 percent of Atlanta’s English Avenue neighborhood, appears before Atlanta Municipal Court Judge Crystal Gaines, Monday, May 18, 2015. His trial was continued to May 27, over objections by the city solicitors office, due to a substitution issue with his new defense attorney, George Lawson. Warren now faces17 charges. As a habitual offender, a conviction would mean jail time. In this most recent case, code enforcement officers say he left a burnt-out house open, vacant and overgrown. He owns at least 100 properties through a half-dozen or more LLCs, many of them crumbling under his ownership. KENT D. JOHNSON /KDJOHNSON@AJC.COM