An abandoned $10 million Hollywood Hills mansion where disgraced rapper Diddy filmed a music video has been vandalised by graffiti artists and taken over by squatters.
Filmmaker Nick Sozonov captured some of Los Angeles’ biggest graffiti artists vandalizing a multi-million dollar Hollywood Hills home that was abandoned by the son of billionaire Philadelphia Phillies owner John S. Middleton, John Powers Middleton.
The beautiful white and glass home, which once belonged to singer Mary J. Blige, is now covered in rainbow art, from words to a crying dead heart to faces.
“With the graffiti towers and this graffiti mansion right now, it feels like a big middle finger to the city,” said Sozonov, who was not involved in the graffiti. ABC 7.
On the corner of the roof it reads: ‘Diddy was here’, as it is the mansion where the rapper, who was arrested in Manhattan this week as part of a sex trafficking investigation, filmed his Video of ‘Last Night’which came out in 2016.
The $10 million mansion owned by billionaire Philadelphia Phillies owner John S. Middleton’s son, John Powers Middleton, has been vandalized by graffiti artists and squatters since he left.
The beautiful white and glass home, which used to belong to singer Mary J. Blige, is now covered in rainbow art, from words to a crying dead heart to faces.
“We all recognized the song, and once we knew that was the house, everyone was excited, like a celebrity mansion,” Sozonov told ABC 7.
The house has seen an influx of graffiti artists after the Diddy connection was made.
The Los Angeles Police Department has been called to the six-bedroom home at least six times this month for reports of vandalism and trespassing and has evicted at least 10 people on Wednesday, according to local media.
One person was arrested on a warrant, ABC 7 said.
One vandal even boasted about his work. KTLAcalling his artwork “beautiful” and said the house had “a lot of potential for graffiti art.”
On the corner of the roof it reads: ‘Diddy was here’, as it is the mansion where the rapper filmed his video Last Night, which came out in 2016.
He said it was easy to enter the property from several access points.
Private security now patrols the house 24 hours a day.
Although the neighborhood did not like the vandalism and squatting, one told KTLA that the graffiti artists were not dangerous and they did not feel unsafe.
“It’s gotten a little bit bigger than it needs to be and there doesn’t seem to be much concern for the safety and well-being of the neighbors,” resident Magnus Fiennes told ABC 7.
Resident Mateo Herrerros said the graffiti artists are also doing graffiti “on other houses on other properties.”
Pictured: Diddy filming inside the mansion for his music video.
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs was arrested this week in Manhattan as part of a sex trafficking investigation.
“I don’t care about this house at all. It’s an abandoned house. The owner doesn’t care. I don’t care much. It’s just the element it brings,” he said. NBC Los Angeles.
Los Angeles Councilwoman Nithya Raman said in a statement to ABC 7 that Middleton is in “serious violation of the law” and said her office would “escalate the matter to the Department of Building and Safety’s abandoned buildings unit to ensure the full extent of enforcement is implemented urgently and expeditiously.”
Raman said Middleton has ignored an abatement order issued by the Department of Buildings.
A lien was also placed on the mansion and Middleton stopped paying property taxes for several years, ABC 7 reported.
Middleton also owns another mansion in the area which he abandoned and which has been taken over by squatters.
The mansion, located at 7571 Mulholland Drive, also used to have squatters until a fence was built to keep them out, but that didn’t last long.
“They cut down the fence. There were a lot of very questionable people,” Karin Gideon told ABC 7. “Some were crazy, some even became threatening,” she said of the squatters.
Neighbors told NBC Los Angeles that the home has been vacant for about a decade, but squatters only started arriving about a year ago.
Middleton bought the property in 2012. Ten years later, he declared it a nuisance and was ordered by the Department of Buildings to build a fence around it, which he failed to do. The city built the fence, according to NBC Los Angeles.
As for the property’s future, neighborhood resident Pat Johnson heard there may be plans for demolition.
This week, Diddy was arrested at the Park Hyatt Hotel in New York City and later charged with sex trafficking and transportation for prostitution, crimes to which he pleaded not guilty in a Manhattan court.
(tags to translate)dailymail
