Prominent ‘nuisance’ home reopened weeks ago. Two drug deaths have occurred there since.
Within weeks of reopening, two people died from overdoses at a well-known Myrtle Beach home that was declared a “nuisance” and closed because of ongoing drug use.
Officials made that claim in the state’s latest efforts to shutter a 5th Avenue North home, known as the “yellow house.”
While the house is still known as the “yellow house,” it was repainted bright teal years ago. The owner, Joe Rideoutte Jr., rents rooms in the home. The prominent house sits near the intersection with North Kings Highway in downtown Myrtle Beach. It has a reputation for being home to drugs and other illegal activity.
South Carolina shut down the house before under the “nuisance” laws. Lawyers filed in Horry County again this week to close the property for a year.
The house closed for a year after being declared for a nuisance, but that closure officially ended in February.
In May, Rideoutte started to rent rooms again, according to court records. A few people could be seen in the home and around the property on Thursday morning.
In June and July, officials say there were at least four drug overdoses at the house — two resulted in people dying.
One death happened around 7:30 p.m. June 26, according to a Myrtle Beach police report. Officers responded to the yellow house for a report of a cardiac arrest. The unidentified victim died in the incident.
Police used a search warrant to enter the home and collect evidence, according to the report.
South Carolina officials note no other Myrtle Beach property has had as many overdoses as the yellow house in the same amount of time.
“This pattern of drug use and overdoses is consistent with prior yellow house activity,” lawyers wrote in the court filing.
The state asked a judge for another order that would close the house for a year. The filing calls the property offensive to “public decency, morals, peal and health.”
Rideoutte’s lawyer, Bert von Herrmann, blasted city officials’ efforts to close the house again and called it government unfairly taking property.
“Myrtle Beach administrators continue to attempt to close places they feel like. They have not made this decision against any operator of a hotel or other place that had political connections with the powers that make these decision. The taxpayers are footing tens of thousands of dollars closing places that people need so they can live and work to get back on there feet. Then the MB downtown authority attempts to buy the property cheap,” von Hrmann said.
“All while crime is arising, protest need addressing to effect change and people are losing their lives and property at an alarming rate but yet they spend their resources fighting a battle to close a single place. I’ll bet they would focus harder on the community if someone would see the amount of taxpayer money is being spent for no reason.”
This story was originally published August 14, 2020 at 10:58 AM.
