He survived six years in a Chinese labor camp, but was no match for the city’s Housing Court.
Joshua Hope, 89, lost his bid to stave off eviction from a church-owned lower Manhattan apartment where he’s lived for 22 years and has been accused of harassing tenants. “They are going to have to evict my corpse,” a defiant Hope said yesterday.
Tomorrow is the 10th anniversary of his wife’s death in the senior-citizen apartment they share at St. Margaret’s House on Fulton Street.
Managers of the 20-story residence, run by Wall Street’s esteemed Trinity Church, have won a Housing Court order calling for Hope’s removal.
Hope is “either unable to control his behavior or elects not to do so,” wrote Housing Court Judge Sabrina Kraus.
Hope and his lawyers say the eviction is retaliation for his efforts to organize neighbors against a meal-plan price increase. He plans to appeal, which will keep him from immediate eviction.