An Odd Little Compound on North Lombard Was Home to a Beloved Chiropractor

ADDRESS: 2126 N Lombard St.

YEAR BUILT: 1956

SQUARE FOOTAGE: 2,550

MARKET VALUE: $998,960

OWNER: 3CHI’S LLC

HOW LONG IT’S BEEN EMPTY: Since 2022

WHY IT’S EMPTY: Tenants victimized their landlord.

For years, Dr. Paul Danis was a chiropractor on North Lombard Street at Lancaster Avenue. He owned the office building in front and lived in one of four small apartments in the back.

Danis, originally from Detroit, was a friend to everyone, says Cheryl Santiago, a real estate agent who befriended him years ago. Homeless people would knock on his door at 2 am, and Danis would give them money. He provided charity care for years. He did magic tricks.

As Danis, now 82, grew older, people began to take advantage of him, Santiago says. He had no family and his finances were in shambles. Tenants in the fourplex didn’t pay rent, and Danis didn’t take action to evict them. The city of Portland sued Danis in 2017 for nonpayment of taxes from 2013 to 2016, demanding almost $10,000, including fines.

Santiago met Danis in 2015 and was delighted by him. She began trying to help him with his money woes, seeing him as a kindly old man being worked over by the world.

“I’m a sucker for a sad story,” Santiago says.

Danis had been laissez-faire about the apartments, and Santiago tried to get him to reengage. She arranged to inspect the units, which angered the tenants, she says. One of them called the city and complained about repairs that were overdue, leading to more fines.

Santiago says she loaned Danis thousands of dollars and took over the mortgage on the property. He gave her power of attorney, and she went to court to evict tenants, court records show. She emptied one unit and brought in a contractor to replace its floor in early 2020.

That’s when things got ugly. The contractor, a man named Tyson Pry, moved his stuff in and squatted in the unit, Santiago says. Then the pandemic hit, making it impossible to get him out. Soon, there were eight people living in the place, Santiago says.

In an eviction complaint filed in July 2021, Santiago says Pry threatened to kill her and another contractor, “using a racially and gender-based derogatory epithet,” and that he broke windows in the apartment and in the chiropractic office.

Santiago filed three complaints in Multnomah County Circuit Court to try and kick Pry out. One document she filed alleges he paid no rent from May 2020 to February 2022. In court documents, Pry said the accusations were false and that he was being evicted for complaining about the place. Finally, in March 2022, Pry and a roommate agreed to leave in exchange for $400 in attorney fees to be paid by Santiago.

Pry couldn’t be reached for comment. His attorney, Scott Staab, didn’t return a call or email.

There were more robberies along the way, including one that prompted Santiago to chase a man into the abandoned Farmer’s Barn (“Chasing Ghosts,” WW, Jan. 28), where she found him wearing nothing but boxer shorts, tube socks and tennis shoes, and wielding a pool noodle.

Santiago says she and her life partner (who co-owns the property) are out hundreds of thousands of dollars, much of which came from their retirement accounts. There are still $180,000 in liens on the property, leaving her no choice but to sell the place.

“The plan was to build affordable housing, or senior housing,” Santiago says. “After what happened, I’m lucky I don’t need housing myself.”

The only upside, Santiago says, is that Danis is living out his last days in relative peace. He lives in an assisted living facility and suffers from dementia and cancer, Santiago says.

“But he’s living his best life,” she says. “My kids call him Papa Paul.”

Every week, WW examines one mysteriously vacant property in the city of Portland, explains why it’s empty, and considers what might arrive there next. Send addresses to newstips@wweek.com.