A Cobb County man could get more than 60 years in prison after a jury found him guilty Thursday of moving in tenants and collecting rent on homes he didn't own, Channel 2 Action News reported.
John Eugene Harris, of Smyrna, had been charged with multiple offenses including burglary, forgery, theft by taking and racketeering in a house-stealing scheme involving his company, “New Life Granted.”
When he was arrested last October, investigators said they had uncovered 19 cases of people who were duped into leasing homes from him, and that there could be hundreds of victims throughout metro Atlanta.
The 45-year-old man had been accused of posing as a leasing agent for the vacant residences – homes that typically were in foreclosure.
According to the charges against him, he broke into the dwellings, changed the locks and leased houses to unsuspecting families – collecting thousands of dollars in security deposits and rents that didn’t rightfully belong to him. Authorities said he was active in seven counties.
Harris testified on his own behalf Thursday, saying his company would find homes that looked abandoned, take them over and move in its own tenants. New Life promised to help people facing foreclosure by restoring their credit and finding them a place to live.
The idea, he said, was lenders foreclosing on a house would be forced to accept the tenants Harris had placed there. But he admitted that toward the end, he began having doubts about the legality of the scheme, Channel 2 reported.
Jurors deliberated for about an hour before finding Harris guilty of all 34 counts against him. He is being held in Cobb County jail and could be ordered to serve as much as 61 years in prison when Cobb County Superior Court Judge Adele Grubbs sentences him May 25.
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