How to protect yourself against rogue landlords

Note - the Landlord Law Blog has now moved to www.landlordlawblog.co.uk.

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An interesting article in the Cash section of the Observer today looks at the increasing tendency of tenants to check up on their landlords before signing a tenancy agreement. And quite right too! As has been reported on this blog in the past, innocent tenants have been known lose their homes at short notice and through no fault of their own, due to their landlords dishonesty. To quote the article:

"When the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) started compiling buy-to-let data in the second half of 2005, only 200 investment properties were in mortgage arrears of three months or more. By the first half of this year, this had soared to 5,400. Repossessions of investment homes also climbed, from 400 to 2,800, during the same period."

Rules are now being put in place to protect tenants from this sort of thing, but even if they do not actually get evicted, the threat of eviction can cause massive worry and upset.

So what can tenants do to protect themselves? Referencing a landlord in the same way that landlords reference tenants is one good option. The article refers to TenantVerify, a service used by many landlords. However there are now also special services being developed for tenants, for example that provided by Rentchecks.com which costs £24.95. You need to get the landlords permission to carry out the check first, but if the landlord refuses to give this, that is a bad sign in itself and indicates that he has something to hide.

The article also points out that if the tenant rents via an agent who is regulated by one of the professional agent organisations such as ARLA, this will offer some protection, as "a good Arla agent will check the landlord's mortgage and insurance company have been informed the property is rented." However you cannot guarantee that this will be done, and as many agents are in financial difficulties, it is possible that they will not enquire too deeply if they think it will scare off a new customer.

There is no doubt though that using a regulated agent is safer than using an unregulated one, who may turn out to be a 'cowboy' who will provide a poor service, or even 'do a runner' taking with him other people's tenancy deposits and rent. The agents regulation organisations to look out for are:

• ARLA - the Association of Residential Letting Agents
  
• RICS - the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors
  
• NALS - the National Approved Letting Scheme
  
• NAEA - the National Association of Estate Agents

All of whom will have client money protection in place, a complaints procedure (via their professional organisation), and whose staff are likely to have been properly trained. It is also a good idea to check whether the agent is registered with the Property Ombudsman.

Another thing tenants need to check, is what is being done about their tenancy deposit. Most tenants should now know that deposits need to be protected by one of the government authorised tenancy deposit schemes, but it is surprising how many people, including many landlords who should know better, are unaware of this. For example in a recent survey the DPS discovered that some 30% of deposits were still not being protected. Talk to your landlord or agent about this and find out which scheme is being used before paying the money over.

The article concludes by saying that if tenants find debt collectors knocking at the door this is bad news and they should seek advice from a reputable organisation such as the Citizens Advice Bureau as soon as possible. Another good choice is Shelter who have a free housing advice helpline on 0808 800 4444.

However even if the worst does come to the worst, thankfully it does look as if more lenders are now willing to appoint a receiver instead of evicting the tenants, and if you find yourself in the position where your landlords lenders are threatening to evict you, you should contact them and suggest this to them. Or get Shelter or the CAB to help you with this.

Have you had problems with your landlord? Or have you any tips on checking up on landlords before renting? If so please leave a comment, below, I would love to hear from you.

Large award for tenant in unlawful eviction case

Note - the Landlord Law Blog has now moved to www.landlordlawblog.co.uk.

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I have just read an interesting case (Hunt v. Hussesin, Epsom County Court) in the housing section of the Legal Action Magazine, which should serve as an awful warning to landlords tempted to lock out their tenants.

In May 2003 Mr Hunt took on an assured shorthold tenancy of a room from Mr and Mrs Hussein, at a weekly rent of £90. However three months later he lost his job. It looks from the report as if he was applying for Housing Benefit, but notwithstanding this, and also notwithstanding a threatening letter sent by the local council, Mr and Mrs Hussein forcibly evicted him by changing the locks and refusing to let him back in again.

Poor old Mr Hunt (45) then had a rather rotten time, sleeping where he could, and it was three months before he was able to find somewhere else to live. Not surprisingly this experience had a very negative effect on him, and four years after the eviction he was diagnosed by a psychiatrist as suffering from severe depression, agoraphobia and 'paranoid ideation' (whatever that is), and was found unfit to work. The psychiatrist's view was that the root cause of his mental deterioration was the trauma of the eviction by the Husseins back in 2003.

However the Husseins were not going to be allowed to get away with it. The local authority prosecuted them under the criminal jurisdiction in the Protection from Eviction Act 1977, and Mrs Hussein was fined £300 and ordered to pay costs of £250. However this was small cheese compared with what was to come next. This was a civil claim based on breach of contract and tort (presumably funded by a no win no fee agreement, Mr Hussein being represented by the Surrey Law Centre), and in July 2009 judgement was entered against Mr and Mrs Hussein.

The judgement was for £56,678.

This was made up of damages of £125 per day for 65 days, damages for personal injury of £45,000, special damages of £100 and interest of £3,453 (plus of course interest will be accruing at a daily rate until the judgement is paid).

The Judgement was a default judgement, which means that the proceedings had been ignored by Mr and Mrs Hussein. However this will not help them, as a 'freezing injunction' was made in respect of their properties, and no doubt Mr Hunt's solicitors are now applying for charging orders and orders for sale. Let us hope for Mr Hunt's sake that there is some equity in them (particularly as the poor man has had to wait so long).

But I expect Mr and Mrs Hussein will now regret treating Mr Hunt so badly. Be warned!

4 Ways To Catch A Rental Scammer - guest blog by Dave Dugdale

Note - the Landlord Law Blog has now moved to www.landlordlawblog.co.uk.

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I run a couple of classified rental sites in America, and while I do not live in England I know from monitoring Twitters search stream on rental scams, that America is not alone when it comes to dealing with rental scammers.

It feels like an on-slot of scammers have been using my sites to create bogus listings the past 10 months. They try to cheat future tenants out of their deposit money. I have been combating them for the past 6 months and I have learned a lot about how they operate.

I thought I would share with Tessas readers how I track down fraudulent rental listings.

Price Is Way Too Low:
If I see a rental listing come in that looks much lower than the others in the neighborhood, that is when my eyebrows go up and I pull up my chair for a closer look. Scammers are impatient, and with a low price they can get leads quickly.

Free Email Address:
The next step is to see if they are using a free email address like Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail etc. Scammers only use free email services they can hide behind.

No Phone Number:
Most of the time the scammers will not list a phone number to call; they will only want to communicate by email. Most legitimate rental listings include a phone number. If none is listed, I look even further.

Exterior Photo Does Not Match Google Street View:
Google traversed American streets a few years back, getting a full street-viewto accompany their maps. I understand that Google has now started this project in England. This becomes a powerful tool for detecting scammers because many times they do not use the photos from the real house, so you can check the listing photos against Google Street View.

Duplicate Content Found On Another Listing:
Most of the scammers I deal with are from Nigeria. They want to blend in with the other listings so instead of writing the description of the rental themselves, they copy it from other rental ads. So, I Google paragraphs of the content to see if I can find a match with different pictures, address or price. This is a sure sign of a scam.

In conclusion
A good rule to follow to avoid becoming a victim in one of these scams is to deal with the owner of the property directly. When renting homes, meeting the property owner at the property is always a good practice. This helps you verify independently whether the offer is bogus or not.

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Bio: Dave Dugdale has been in the online rental advertising business for 5
years with his sites RentVine.com and PickRent.com. He was the first to write a blog on the rental ad industry, and the first to podcast interviews of industry experts in property management (all for a USA audience). Dave has also been leading the way in better detection of rental scams by sharing his database of blacklist email addresses with competitors.

Shoddy HMOs? Don't blame the law, blame the enforcers

A recent article on the BBC news site, complains that landlords are avoiding the HMO licensing regulations by developing HMOs in buildings which do not come within the categories which require licensing, which in most cases requires a building to have three or more stories. Hence, the article implies, landlords are able to get away with shocking standards with impunity.

Well yes, but thats not wholly because of the HMO legislation. There is already power available to Local Authorities to deal with substandard properties. Under part 1 of the Housing Act 2004, Local Authorities can carry out inspections on properties under the Housing Health and Safety Rating System and serve improvement notices on the landlord requiring him to bring the property up to standard. If the landlord fails to do this, the Local Authority can prosecute, and also has the power to get the repair works done itself (and recoup the cost from the landlord).

Any one can contact the Local Authority if they are concerned about the standard of a property, it does not have to be the tenant. Local Authorities have a general duty to "keep the housing conditions in their area under review with a view to identifying any action that may need to be taken by them" (s3(1)).

Then there are the HMO management regulations. These require all HMOs to be managed properly and comply with basic standards. Landlords not complying with these, can also be prosecuted.

So although extending the licensing requirements might help, Local Authorities already have powers to deal with shoddy properties in their area, whether they are HMOs or not. The problem, so far as I can see, is not lack of power to do these things, but lack of funding and manpower. Presumably, as Mr Brown has mortgaged the country in order to pay the banks, this is not a situation which is likely to improve in the near future. What do you think?

Canadian landlords trample on tenants human rights, says survey

A newspaper report here, describes a survey in Toronto in Canada which shows that vulnerable people are regularly being discriminated against by landlords. To quote the article:

To test landlord compliance, the centre created five "renter profiles" – a single mother with one child; a black single mother with one child; a single South Asian man, a single man with a mental illness and a married woman on provincial disability benefits.

Volunteers posing as these vulnerable renters made telephone inquires about 982 apartments listed for rent across Toronto last summer. Each call was followed up within 1 1/2 hours by another volunteer with no discernable grounds for discrimination.

Each pair asked the same 12 questions and the landlords' responses were recorded and analyzed for mild, moderate or severe differential treatment.

For example, to gauge discrimination against the South Asian man, one caller used a distinct South Asian accent and name, while the second caller had no accent and used a Western European name.

Discrimination against the South Asian man ranged from not having his call returned to being told the unit was already rented when it was still available.

The South Asian man also faced extra application requirements such as being asked for postdated cheques. And 31 per cent of the time, he was offered fewer move-in incentives such as free cable TV, the study found.

"In some cases, the landlord makes the unit so unappealing that he doesn't have to turn the person down," said John Fraser, the centre's program director.

The centre's results are similar to those from studies in the United States, where community-based organizations regularly monitor discrimination in rental housing, Fraser said.

It would be interesting to see a similar study here in the United Kingdom.

Possible scam with tenants' deposit money

Note - the Landlord Law Blog has now moved to www.landlordlawblog.co.uk.

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There has been quite a bit of publicity over the last few months about agents and the unjust charges they impose on both tenants and also the landlords they represent. The CAB did a report on this which I wrote about here. I have now been contacted by a tenant telling me about what he suspects may be another scam by agents (and potentially also landlords), although it is not something he can prove. I copy his email below:

I recently quit a tenancy in Bath and moved to London. The deposit on the Bath flat was held by the DPS [Deposit Protection Service]. I couldn't remember how much the deposit was, but I had the DPS letter saying it was £1050.

While clearing out some boxes, I found some more paperwork: the receipt from the letting agent that showed I'd paid £1575 deposit. I keep my bank statements, and these confirmed the deposit was £1575. The letting agent had placed £1050 with the DPS and kept £525.

A percentage of tenants - especially after a long tenancy - are going to forget the amount of the deposit and / or lose their original paperwork. At the end of their tenancy, they ring the DPS, establish themselves as entitled to the deposit and are told how much was lodged with the DPS. If the letting agent or landlord only lodged part of the deposit with the DPS, the letting agent / landlord get to keep the rest. If the tenant knows how much the deposit was and can prove it, they just apologise and agree to return it.

In my case, the letting agent accepted immediately what had happened, said they'd made a mistake and apologised.

I think it would be hard to detect this happening. I can't prove it wasn't a mistake. I should have checked the DPS letter when it arrived but even if I had, the letting agent would have apologised and placed the correct amount with the DPS.

The scam only works when the tenant forgets the amount and in that situation, they don't even know they've been robbed. The landlord / letting agent get to keep a percentage of deposits they handle. This can be a lot of money if only a small proportion of tenants "forget".

If nothing else this story emphasises the point that tenants must check everything so as to protect their position (and I would add that the correct amount of the deposit should be set out in the tenancy agreement). The agent in this case could have made a genuine mistake of course, but did they? Have any other tenants experienced this?

FSA to regulate sale and rent back sector

Homeowners in distress who have sold their property to a 'sale and rent back' company in the belief that they will be able to live their for the rest of their lives, only be to kicked out a year later, will be pleased to learn that this sector is now to be regulated by the Financial Services Authority.

An interim regulations period (while they work out how to regulate it properly - although the draft rules are said to be 'near final') will start on 1 July 2009 and firms will be expected to apply for 'interim permission' between this date and 1 August. A consultation paper is expected for September, with full regulation from the end of June 2010.

During this interim period, firms will need to meet FSA threshold conditions including the requirement to have adequate resources and to be run by fit and proper people. Firms will also have to comply with the Principles for Businesses and meet a number of systems and controls and conduct of business rules.

You can find a bit more in policy statement and in the FSA's statement of the 3 June here.

A new landlord scam

A new landlord scam has been highlighted on the Directgov web-site.

Tenants answering ads on web-sites such as Gumtree, fish4 of Craig's List are being asked to 'prove that they have enough money' by transferring money to a friend or relative.

They are then asked to send a scanned copy of the transaction receipt to the 'landlord' as proof that they have enough money to rent the property. However, the receipt contains enough information for the criminals to collect the money first.

So if you or someone you know is thinking of renting property, watch out for this.

You can read more here.

The Dickens case

Those who have read articles here in the past about ASBO landlord Dickens will find an excellent report on the Nearly Legal site here.

Convicted HMO landlord – doing the community a service?

This is the sort of attitude that Local Authorities have to put up with. Mr Bowden in Ipswich, who recently pleaded guilty convicted in the Magistrates Court to operating a house of multiple occupation without a licence (reported here), considers he has done nothing wrong. However,

- The property had 19 people living in it
- There were minimal fire precautions
- A converted attic was only accessible via an unsafe staircase
- A woman was living in a room with no natural light,

to name just a few of the problems. Yet Mr Bowden claimed "It seems a ridiculous thing to go to court about. It's something over nothing. Yes, I should've had a licence to rent a third floor, but I wasn't aware I needed one. … I've given people a roof over their heads that they otherwise couldn't get. Some people can't afford a deposit so I asked for very little. In some respects I was helping the council out but obviously they took a different view - I think I was doing the community a good service."

There is of course some force in what he says. It is generally better for the homeless person to be in an unsafe building than on the street. However an unsafe building threatens everyone around it. If there was a fire, all of the 19 occupants could have been killed, along with those living in adjacent properties. It cannot be allowed.

Mr Bowden, despite his protestations, is no doubt aware of this. Apparently when Environmental Health Officials made an appointment to view the property he made sure his tenants were out of the way.

It is good to see that there are more and more reports of Local Authorities using their powers under the Housing Act 2004, for example a report here of a landlord fined in Oxford.. I firmly believe that Local Authority action is the best way to deal with defective property, and that it should not be up to individual tenants to do this.

Landlords responsiblities for fire safety

I have been sent a press release by the Fire Brigade regarding a sucessful prosecution of a landlord who was found guilty of breaches of fire safety legislation and ordered to pay nearly £13,000 in fines and costs. The press release reads:

Uxbridge Magistrates' Court fined Armajit Singh, £5,600 for seven breaches of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005. Mr. Singh did not own the premises but was managing it for his uncle and had responsibility for the property’s maintenance and repairs.

The prosecution followed a fire at the house converted into flats on Wood End Green Road, Hayes on 14 September 2007. A man and a woman were woken by the blaze and tried to escape via the staircase but it was engulfed by thick black smoke. They escaped by smashing the first floor bedroom window and jumping out. The woman broke her ankle in the fall and the man suffered deep cuts to his hands.

Fire safety inspectors visited the premises and found that there were a number of faults including no smoke alarm or fire extinguishers in the property and none of the doors were fire resistant.

The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 came into force in October 2006. In a landlord and tenant context it provides for those in control of properties and responsible for the maintenance and repairs (generally this will be the landlord) to carry out a fire risk assessment (which must be kept up to date), and to implement appropriate fire safety measures to minimise the risk to life from fire.

Note that the two pictures showing the damage done by the fire are copyright of the London Fire Brigade.



Mind you, maybe Mr Singh got off lightly. In October, Mr Mehmat Parlak was sentenced to four months imprisonment and his company, Watchacre properties limited, was fined £21,000 following a similar prosecution under the Regulations. Landlords be warned!

Another mortgagee / tenant eviction case

I have another mortgagee evicting innocent tenant case for you. Here I was consulted by the letting agent who had been contacted by the distressed tenant. She had just found out she was being evicted, after having received the normal notice which is served on the occupier of the property in these cases. My client was furious as he felt that the landlord had deceived him, plus he was concerned that this situation would reflect badly on his agency business, although it was no fault of his. The property had apparently been owned by the landlord for some time, had been previously rented out by another agency, and there was nothing to alert him to the mortgage problems, otherwise (he told me) he would never have taken the property on.

His main concern was for the tenant however, and he attended Court where he spoke to the Judge about the case.

Apparently this was a second mortgage, and the mortgage company had not been paid since the tenancy started three months ago. The agent asked the Judge, on behalf of the tenant, if he would grant a stay or make a 56 day order, to allow the tenant to continue to live in the property until the end of her tenancy. The solicitor for the mortgagee asked for a 28 day possession order. After considering matters the Judge decided to make a 28 day order. However the tenant will have in the region of 2 months in the property before any bailiffs appointment, which will allow her time to find somewhere else to live (although apparently she had fallen in love with the property and will be sad to leave).

I suggested to the agent that he might want to review his agency terms and conditions and consider including a clause (assuming there is not one there already) specifically providing for the landlord to warrant that all mortgage payments for the property were fully paid up and would continue to be paid for the period of the tenancy. This would mean that if the landlord did default, he would be in breach of his agency agreement, which might give the agent more freedom of action. Agents might also want to consider calling for proof that the mortgage is paid up when taking on new instructions, so as to avoid a situation such as that in my previous post, where an order for possession had been made before the property was ever let to the tenant.

With the property crisis deepening, we will probably be seeing more and more of these sad cases.

Agents letting property subject to a re-possession order

Note - the Landlord Law Blog has now moved to www.landlordlawblog.co.uk.

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There is quite a lot of discussion about tenants evicted unfairly by landlords in retaliation for something that they have done, such as complain about repairs. However there is another type of unfair eviction where tenants do not even get the benefit of the two months notice under section 21 which tenants receive in a retaliatory eviction. I am talking about tenants who get evicted by the landlords mortgage company when the landlord fails to meet his mortgage payments.

I was consulted by tenants on one of these cases recently. They had rented what they believed to be their dream home, only to find two months later, the bailiffs at the door. It was a complete surprise to them because the possession order had been obtained before the property had been let to them!

Yes, amazing though it seems, the possession order was made several weeks before the tenancy was granted, and the date for possession in the order had actually expired the day before my clients tenancy started (by the way they know I writing this and have given their consent). Therefore the notice which mortgagees are required to serve on occupiers of properties did not help them, as it had been served over six months ago!

The property was rented via an agency and the question comes to mind – what is the agents obligation here? Under agency law an agent is generally not liable for the acts or omissions of its principal. However what if the property they are presenting to the public as a suitable home, is one which is vulnerable to repossession from the moment the ink dries on the tenancy agreement?

I had a word with one of my letting agent clients about the sort of checks that are generally done in the business against their landlord clients and the properties they take on. It seems that the answer is ‘not much’ Apparently landlords are sometimes asked to sign a form saying that they are authorised to let the property and that there are no legal problems or other problems with it. Well that’s not much good is it? A dishonest landlord is going to sign that without a qualm.

I can’t help feeling that there should be some sort of obligation on agents to check this sort of thing. After all in this case the agent was offering to let through its business, a property which had a substantial defect – i.e. it was vulnerable to repossession at any moment. It seems wrong for the agent to be able to pocket its commission (taken from my clients rent) and then say “sorry gov, nothing to do with me”. Which is in effect what they are doing.

What do other people think?

Policing the Landlords

I have just listened to an interesting program on Radio 4 (via the listen again facility) which is on problems tenants at the lower end of the market experience. The presenter finally managed to speak to one of the landlords whose properties featured in the program, who took the view that he was spending loads of money doing up properties for ‘scumbags’, who then don’t look after them properly (leading, he implied, to the condition the presenter found them in). Hmm.

It is very sad that this sort of thing is still going on, and that some tenants are frightened to report poor conditions because they are scared of being evicted. Either legally via section 21 or by the boys coming round to evict them forcibly.

The program mentioned the current review of the private sector being undertaken at York University, and it will be interesting to see if there are any suggestions in the report on how to deal with this sort of thing.

The program pointed out that the majority of landlords are responsible and provide decent properties. No doubt they would be very happy to see the back of the criminal landlord who gives them all a bad name.

At the time of writing you can listen to the program via this link, but I am not sure how long this will stay online.

Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose

I did my Q&A this morning, something I do every other Sunday morning, and which see I wrote about nearly a year ago on this blog. I always get far more questions than the 10 that get answered (I had 32 today I think) and the same old questions still keep cropping up.

For example, unbelievably, there are still landlords who think that they can go in and change the locks if their tenant has not moved out after the notice period of the possession notice expires. I still get loads of questions on damage deposits, and from the way some of these are worded it is apparent that the landlords are failing to protect deposits under the statutory tenancy deposit schemes. Properties are still being let in a poor condition, and there still appear to be quite a lot of dodgy and/or useless agents, greedy landlords, and clueless (or thick) tenants about.

No change there then.

ASBO landlord Dickens again

My anonymous correspondent (postmark Colwyn Bay) has sent me a cutting from the Big Issue Magazine, which shows that ASBO landlord Dickens is facing yet more court appearances. He has now received a summons from the Health and Safety Executive under the gas regulations, the gas appliances in his former properties having been substandard and the flues full of rubble.

I am glad to see the HSE doing something in respect of these regulations, which after all are there to prevent people being killed by gas emissions. I am just concerned to see that the article emphasises how unusual it is for the HSE to summons offenders in this way.

The article goes on to say that the authorities are using this high profile case to send out a strong message to landlords in North Wales. If that message is that avoidance of the gas safety regulations will result in prosecution, I hope that they will bring a few more, to press the message home. There is not a lot of point in having safety regulations if they are not enforced.

Two more bad landlord stories

Landlords may moan about the new HMO licensing rules, but two stories which have come my way recently show that there are still bad landlords out there.

Firstly, this report on Youillscar Mohammed a Landlord in Glasgow who not only let out HMO properties without the proper fire precautions, but asked tenants to lie for him so he would not have to pay the license fee.

Then there is our old friend, ASBO landlord Dickens from North Wales, who has (according to a report in the Daily Post) recently had charges brought against him under the gas safety regulations. Although apparently he has now sold most of his portfolio, so the tenants of Conwy are now fairly safe from him.

I dare say these are not the only offenders. Although I agree that the disparity in the license fees across the different authorities is unfair, I do think that basically the regulation of landlords, at least in the more vulnerable HMO area, is justified, if it helps prevent this sort of thing, and keeps tenants safe.

Luckless landlord meets Nearly Legal in court

There is interesting post on the Nearly Legal web-site recently on how a tenant (with the help of Nearly Legal) fought back against a nightmare landlord. None of my landlords of course would dream of behaving like that, but there is always one. Or three. Or more.

Its nice to see that at least some tenants are able to get decent legal aid help and do something about injustice. I think Nearly Legal ought to go for damages for unlawful eviction, if only to punish the landlord and replenish the legal aid fund. But we need to be told how much they get ...

Killer landlord

Be careful who you lodge with! Lodging with tunisian immigrant Abder-rahmen Dhaou cost Kynan Eldridge his life. The landlord stabbed him after an altercation about some rent believed to be as little as £50.

Much to Mr Eldridge's family's distress Dhaou only got a sentance of three years, but the Judge recommended that he be deported at the end of his sentance.

You can read more about it here. Mind you I suspect killer landlords are rare, but it still pays to be very careful who you share lodgings with.

More on rogue landlord Dickens

My anonymous correspondent has sent me a further cutting in the story of ASBO landlord Steven Dickens. You can see my previous post here. It seems that the charming Mr Dickens will be facing fraud charges totaling some £7 million. You can read about it in the North Wales Pioneer - do a search on Steven Dickens - the entry is dated 1 August 2006.

However I should assure readers that very few landlords behave in this way. Although it is comforting to know that dishonest landlords are now being prosecuted and brought to book. It is a pity that this did not happen more in the past. Bad landlords are bad news for good landlords as they taint peoples' view of landlords in general.

Meanwhile it will be interesting to see what happens during Mr Dickens trial, whether he gets convicted, and if so, what his sentence will be.