Loud parties, profanity-filled arguments, a drug overdose and abysmal upkeep plague the five single-family houses Terry Gaca owns in Naperville, according court documents and interviews with neighbors.
Attorney Thomas Frederick stands near the property just yards from his Lisson Road home in Naperville that has been rented out as a boarding house and for vehicle storage, in violation of city ordinances and court rulings. Frederick has taken his neighbor to court in a civil suit in an effort to get city codes enforced and illegal tenants removed at this property and four others in Naperville.
A Will County judge last year allowed the city to join Frederick’s lawsuit, and could rule this summer on an injunction to stop Gaca from illegally operating boarding houses at all five of Naperville properties, including the four in DuPage County. DuPage County real estate tax records list Terry Gaca as the owner of the property at 202 Pepperidge Road in Naperville.
On Nov. 15, 2018, police were called to 202 Pepperidge Road, where they found a 24-year-old woman unconscious and not breathing. Police reports show the woman was taken to Edward Hospital in Naperville, where she was pronounced dead. The DuPage County coroner ruled the death as an overdose.
“The chimney, if you can call it a chimney, is no longer brick,” Sem said. “It’s wrapped with sheet metal and spray painted and held together with metal straps.”Sem said complaints to the city about the driveway expansion prompted Gaca to post a large cardboard sign on his mailbox stating he had done nothing wrong and Naperville code enforcement wasn’t going to do anything about it.
DuPage County real estate tax records list Terry Gaca as the owner of the property at 4 W. Bailey Road in Naperville. “Where I see the problem is if you are trying to sell a house within view of one of his properties, it definitely affects it. ... It does cut down on your buyer pool for those houses for sure,” Jones said.City spokeswoman Linda LaCloche said Naperville has pursued more than 20 actions since 2017 to bring Gaca’s properties into compliance with zoning ordinances, including code enforcement citations and lawsuits in state and federal court.
Court documents show Gaca, who was living at 2401 Lisson Road at the time, responded with his own legal actions in Will County court, suing the city and a zoning code enforcement officer for assault, intimidation, trespassing and official misconduct. A Will County judge in October 2018 sided with the city and ordered Gaca to pay $199.61 in court costs, court documents show.
“Despite the city’s success in those cases, the property owner remains obstinate concerning code compliance,” LaCloche said. After months of requests for dismissal and a complaint filed against Frederick with Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission, which was dismissed, records show the court in February 2020 ordered Gaca, his wife and their trusts to shut down the boarding house and parking and storage business on the Lisson property.The decision was affirmed on appeal by the Third District Appellate Court, and the Illinois Supreme Court rejected Gaca’s appeal in September 2021, court documents show.