Brittany Washington was cleaning her dishes when she felt a familiar tingle on her arm. Familiar because it wasn't her first encounter with a cockroach in her small Long Beach apartment.
"When I see them crawl across my bed, that's when I figured it was a problem," Washington said. "It's just disgusting."
Roaches have scurried up her arm while watching TV and in her tiny kitchen; they can be seen crawling through cabinets.
Despite several attempts to get rid of the uninvited guests, Washington's apartment located at 1073 East 4th St. is still crawling with them. But the roaches may not be the only problem to make your skin crawl.
Just around the corner, in a unit next to Washington's, a tenant died. It wasn't until two weeks later when the smell became so over-powering and tenants complained, that the corpse was discovered.
"They were just swarms of flies just flying out of there," Washington recalls.
Three months later, the body is gone but the apartment hasn't been touched. Stains from body fluids can been seen on the carpet and flies are still buzzing.
Washington, who is studying to be a paralegal, is searching for a resolution. She complained to her landlord but that didn't go anywhere, so she called a health inspector.
Despite her concerns, the health inspector said he could not enforce a clean up of the apartment because it's not in a public area, Washington said.
NBCLA called the apartment manager who referred us to the property owner. He told us by phone he was not aware the apartment had not been cleaned but he did say he would take care of it.
As for the roaches, Washington says she wants to move to another unit and is disputing her lease. One look at the roaches, and you could guess why.
