TORONTO — Nazmina Ladha found an advertisement in her mailbox last month for a landscaper offering lawn care services. But she regrets the $100 cash she paid to Carmelo Lamanna, the man behind the flyer.
“In my opinion, I got zero value,” said Ladha.
She says the money was supposed to cover the cost of cutting her front and rear lawn and applying weed killer.
“My grass was not cut. None of my weeds have died.”
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Ladha, who was injured six months ago in an accident, says she is unable to care for the yard herself. She says that’s why she hired Lamanna, owner of Carm’s Landscaping Inc., of Scarborough.
She contacted Global News after repeated efforts to get Lamanna back to finish the work, or offer a refund.
“It was just daylight robbery, it was cheating,” she said.
Global News caught up with Lamanna in North York, when he showed up at a home to provide a quote. He told a Global News intern he has been “in business for 15 years.”
Later, when asked why he didn’t cut Ladha’s grass as contracted, Lamanna had no answer. Instead, he grabbed a reporter’s microphone and tipped over a waste can as he bolted from the house with the TV crew in tow.
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Lamanna’s female companion sped away from the house as Lamanna ran down the street, saying he was calling the police.
Approached by the television crew at a corner, Lamanna got out of the car and attacked Global News cameraman, Rick Helinski. Lamanna punched the camera before running down the street again and later leaving with the woman in her car.
After watching the television report, Ladha said she was pleased to see Lamanna exposed. She says Lamanna similarly ran away from her home after other contractors tried to encourage him to finish her job.
“Why would he run?” said Ladha, who says she worries about other consumers who have paid money to Lamanna.
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