Metro

Rent ‘scammer’ vows a fight to the ‘death’

FLASHBACK: How Post told the story yesterday. (
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The Brooklyn woman sued for pretending her dead aunt was alive so she could stay in the woman’s rent-stabilized apartment is ready to fight for the pad.

Brenda Williams, 55, paid $287 a month by fooling her landlord into thinking Debbie Vaughan, who died in 2007 at age 93, was still alive, a lawsuit charges.

But Williams told The Post that landlord Phil Cramer knew all along and allowed her to stay in the Vanderbilt Avenue apartment that Vaughan was dead.

“I’ve been living here since 1985. He knew I was there,” said a defiant Williams. “All of a sudden, they want to come at me with their big guns. Pull out whatever you need. I’ll pull out what I got.”

Cramer, who owns the apartment in the co-op building, said he never met Williams until filing the $405,000 suit. He said he kept Vaughan’s rent low and paid her maintenance charges because she was elderly.

“I’m angry,” Cramer told The Post. “I was trying to do a good thing, but sometimes that backfires.”

The co-op alerted Cramer to the alleged scam in 2010 after entering the residence and finding a bare mattress.