NASHUA – When Richard Jean decided to add a three-season porch to his 3 Cherokee Ave. home in 2016, city officials said, he went to City Hall to apply for the requisite permit.

Roughly two weeks later, the officials said, they approved Jean’s plans and issued him his permit – in what court documents indicate may have been the parties’ final cordial interaction.

Those documents are contained in the civil lawsuit the city filed against Jean in January, accusing him of ignoring officials’ orders to halt construction after he failed a structural inspection. The suit states this prompted the city to assess daily fines that by December had accrued to an eye-popping $108,600.

A hearing in the matter scheduled for Tuesday was continued at the request of Jean’s attorney, Gerald Prunier. City Corporation Counsel Steve Bolton agreed to the continuation, according to the motion.

City Department of Building Safety manager William McKinney said Wednesday the hearing has been rescheduled for March 6. The case is being heard in Hillsborough County Superior Court-South in Nashua.

In the complaint, McKinney and Bolton indicate the series of problems between Jean and the city began in June 2017, shortly after a “framing and structural inspection” took place.

The inspection, officials said, revealed the porch framing and roof “were not built in accordance with the approved permit.”

“We approved his plans for the porch, but he didn’t construct it according to those plans,” McKinney said. “And he proceeded to do work outside our recommendations.”

Officials informed Jean of their findings, and told him he should apply for a new permit “showing the actual framing and roof design,” McKinney said.

But Jean allegedly responded by not only continuing work on the porch, but enlarging the scope of the project as well.

“Rather than remedying the situation … the defendant proceeded to convert the porch into an additional interior room,” officials wrote in the suit.

Now, McKinney said, officials have concerns regarding the structural integrity of the roof, mainly because Jean, in allegedly finishing the interior, “covered up the framing and structural support … (and) added gas and electrical connections, all without required permits or inspections.”

By the end of May, officials issued Jean a formal notice of violation after their “efforts to address the issues informally failed.”

While the parties were able to “work out some other issues” with Jean, McKinney said, the framing and roof issues “have never passed required inspections.”

Among the remedies the city seeks in the suit is a request that a judge issue an injunction prohibiting “the occupancy of the entire home at any time, however short, until the violation is corrected and a final inspection is passed.”

McKinney said the city will ask the judge for the injunction at the March 6 hearing.

As for the six-figure fine Jean may face, McKinney said the statute calls for a $275 fine for the first offense, then $550 for each subsequent offense – with each day being a separate offense.

“It’s not an avenue we like to use,” McKinney said of the assessed fines. “We try to work with everyone, to find reasonable solutions.”

He said the city has given Jean options “to correct this” without going to court, but to no avail.

As for the $108,600 figure, McKinney said the city had computed it beginning May 29, when they served Jean with an official notice of violation, through Dec. 12.

But as McKinney noted, the accrual clock doesn’t stop “just because we invite him to court.”

If that’s the case, the fine, if accrued through Wednesday, would come to just under $151,000.

On Wednesday, a truck with a plow attached sat in the driveway of 3 Cherokee Ave., a split-level residence currently valued at $256,000, according to city property tax records.

Jean bought the home, which sits on a quarter-acre lot, about three years ago. It was built in 1968, records show.

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