Transient Lived in Escondido Garden Shed

For several nights in August, a perplexed resident of Mountain Shadows Mobile Home Park in Escondido heard voices coming from her next-door neighbor’s coach. Whether she was out on her back porch or lying in bed, at around midnight, the resident often heard chitchat — even though the place had been empty for several months, due to foreclosure.

On September 5, the mystery was solved when the resident woke up and found the door of her neighbor’s shed wide open, as well as a gate on the west side of the property. Upon closer inspection, she found food wrappers and other garbage inside the shed. She now believes that someone, possibly a transient, had taken up residence there.

“I’ve lived here for 16 years, but nothing this brazen has happened before,” she said. “About one year ago, someone tried breaking into my car because my daughter had left clothes and books in the backseat, but living in the shed beats everything.”

The resident attributes the neighborhood’s crime problems to drug addicts: “Every year, we get a post-office box at tax time because addicts pilfer the mail looking for refund checks,” she said. “We find mail in the street.” She added that police have been patrolling the field at the end of the block, where many transients stay.